I found the MC more irritating than I did with the 1st book, but she had a great character arc. The author did a great job subtly summarizing what happened in book 1 without pulling me out of the current story, which was good because it‘s been a while since I listened to that one. The story has plenty of suspense, tragedy, magic, and growth between the characters. There are also some NSFW scenes so I couldn‘t listen when my kids were in the car.