REVIEW: SIEGE AND STORM by Leigh Bardugo ~ P.S. I love that book!

Title: Siege and Storm
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Series: The Grisha #2
Genres: YA, Fantasy, Romance
Publisher: Square Fish
Source: Physical copy
Pages: 435

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SYNOPSIS: 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.

HANNAHCASSIE'S REVIEW

I really loved the first book! It had everything in it: magic, culture, court, lovable lead character, perfect love interest and super huge twist! However, I always have a fear for the second books having a second book syndrome and so the Siege and Storm was being all comfortable on my shelf for rather awhile. But the time finally came!

THE WORLD: The world Leigh Bardugo creates is just breath taking! Ah, I do not even know where to begin! So the kingdom of our interest is Ravka - a land divided into two by the dark Fold in between which is full of volcras - monsters that just tear you apart the moment you set the foot inside of the Fold. The kingdom is also at war with other kingdoms and of course the king that rules Ravka is just incompetent. The Darkling, King's right hand tries to take the power into his own hands and then the hell breaks lose... Did I get of topic? I told you I just don't know how to describe it!

CHARACTERS: Alina is a Sun Summoner, one of its kind and considered a Saint by many. Now, in first book Alina was rather clueless girl but in this book I grew to really like her. She is trying to be strong, she is trying to rule and do what is best for the kingdom. Go Alina! Mal on the other hand...oh wow...I have not seen something, well yes something so pathetic for a long time. Imagine, Alina is an ordinary girl and loves Mal but Mal just sleeps around with everybody like arrogant jerk he is. Then Alina discovers she is a most powerful Grisha with her Light Summoning power and The Darkling, another most powerful Grisha takes a big interest in her. What does Mal do? He runs back and suddenly he wants Alina because you know the poor girl is actually considered by somebody else to be good enough. So okay, now Alina is in the palace all powerful, she is suffering and cannot trust anybody, Grisha hate her but she still is doing everything to help them and what Mal does? He cries that Alina does not give him attention and starts drinking, fighting and again sleeping around and when Alina finds out and tells him all about her fears and all he just goes getting drunk and abandoning his post as guard which almost gets Alina killed. Bravo Mal, you are the most pathetic perversion of a man I have ever seen. And the Darkling...well he is not really in the book much, he is just being pure evil and annoying me so much!

LOVE: Yeah so have I told you about Mal? You know the truth is, I do not care with who Alina ends up as long it is not Mal.

PLUS: I really love the world of this book and all the court and oh yeah just the magic it has! Is it just awesome! And I like the way the story is going actually, even if it made this book rather slow.

MINUS: MAL!

EXTRA: The short story about Genya in the end of the book...that was just so nice. I truly love Genya! She is a sweetness!

LAURA'S REVIEW

This is the second book of The Grisha Trilogy by Leigh Bardugo. I bought all the books and the first one I loved. This one was alright... second books are always a bit weaker so I'm not worried about the third one.

THE WORLD: it's still the same as in the first one and HannahCassie did a good job explaining it. There is Ravka (where the story takes place) and the borders of Shu Han and Fjerda. The main difference is that The Fold has expanded a bit and also some places beyond the True Sea are mentioned. I leave a map for a better overview:

CHARACTERS: the main characters are also the same... Alina, Mal, and The Darkling. But a few more are introduced like Sturmhond, a privateer (another name for pirate basically), who has more secrets than charm and that's already saying a lot. There is more told about Genya, a Grisha who works in Palace and becomes a friend of Alina (who also has more secrets than you would like to think), and Zoya, also a Grisha who had been a favorite of The Darkling and therefore has the duty of being a pain in the ass to Alina.

LOVE: ugh, there is a hint of a love triangle but not really and thanks Leigh for that because I can't deal with them. And in this book it becomes more and more clear that Alina has already made a choice. A choice nobody understands. Oh well.

PLUS: in my opinion the major plus of this book is the end. It's quite shocking and you're left wondering how on Earth is Alina going to manage 'it'... ppsssttt guess what it means? Hint: read HannahCassie's description of the world again.

MINUS: it has a very weak middle. All those pages about politics and religion are just plain boring... and there is not enough of The Darkling in this book. In fact, there are also no answers in this book. Just a book to carry on the story so I am guessing the final book will be epic then.

And I totally agree Mal is very annoying in this book. He doesn't add anything to the story for now.

OVERALL: 3 stars. The book starts quite well but has a very weak middle... there is a bunch of endless useless pages that only go on and on but the end was quite shocking. PLOT TWIST!