Siege and Storm

Title: Siege and Storm
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Series: The Grisha (#2)
Pages: 435 (paperback)
Published: June 2013
(All links lead to the books' respective Goodreads pages)

Summary: Darkness never dies. Hunted across the True Sea, haunted by the lives she took on the Fold, Alina must try to make a life with Mal in an unfamiliar land. She finds starting new is not easy while keeping her identity as the Sun Summoner a secret. She can’t outrun her past or her destiny for long.

The Darkling has emerged from the Shadow Fold with a terrifying new power and a dangerous plan that will test the very boundaries of the natural world. With the help of a notorious privateer, Alina returns to the country she abandoned, determined to fight the forces gathering against Ravka. But as her power grows, Alina slips deeper into the Darkling’s game of forbidden magic, and farther away from Mal. Somehow, she will have to choose between her country, her power, and the love she always thought would guide her--or risk losing everything to the oncoming storm.

My Thoughts: I absolutely loved the first book of Leigh Bardugo's The Grisha series, Shadow and Bone, so of course I went into this continuation of the series with kind of high hopes. In no way did I hate this book, but it just didn't soar for me and took me a while to really get into it because of the somewhat predictable storyline.

First of all, the chemistry between Mal and Alina just wasn't there like it was in the first book. I mean Sturmhond and Alina had more chemistry, heck even Alina and Baghra had more chemistry on the page than Mal and Alina. Mal just sort of fell flat for me. But Sturmhond was an amazing addition to this eclectic cast of characters. He was so fun to read and I couldn't get enough of his wit and banter with Alina throughout pretty much all of their shared scenes.

Speaking of Alina, her character development took off during this book. She went from a meek, quiet, and weak Sun Summoner who didn't really know what she wanted to do except run from the Darkling. She ends up being a kick-butt opinionated character and even though you're led to believe to that her new found attitude is due in part to her amplifier, I like to think that it's that (because it made for an interesting addition to the narrative) as well as Alina coming into her own and accepting her fate to save Ravka.

Alina with ambition is much more interesting than scared and running Alina. And I guess that's why Mal was so boring to me. His world is Alina. He lives and breathes for Alina. That's all well and good for the romance side of the story but when he seemed to become a plot device to give Alina a reason not to move on from who she used to be, I found it tedious. I wish instead of Mal's whining for days of old we could have at least seen more Grisha power awesomeness or maybe gotten more of an idea of what the Darkling was up to because dang I couldn't get enough of those aspects of this world.

And I think that may be why even though this book wasn't as well-rounded as I expected it to be, I still love this series and cannot wait to read the third book of the series, Ruin and Rising. The last three chapters of this book were the saving grace, honestly. I sped through that last section, read the novella The Traitor that was included with my edition of the book, and was left hungry and wanting to know what happens next! The crazy, action-packed climax was beautifully executed, had plenty of action, and had a killer cliffhanger, too.

I loved learning about the power dynamics and politics of the Grisha world as well as the world outside of the first and second armies, which is probably my favorite part about this series. The world building is so in depth, the history is so rich, and I mean... I need more I can't get enough of this world it's so cool. It's just such a wonderfully written world and I look forward to diving back into Bardugo's series soon!
My Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5