I immediately bought and finished the sequels to Shadow & Bone after reading it in a day. The plot twist didn’t throw me off as much as it did Kiesha, so I forged on.
I’m a little confused as to what to write about the Grisha Trilogy, primarily because I’m not entirely sure how I felt about it. I was very disinterested in half, but loved the other half—so I’m kind of in the middle.
The first book was by far my favorite. The second, Siege and Storm, was my least favorite. I’m not a quitter, so I went ahead and read the third book, Ruin and Rising, anyway. I don’t regret it.
My opinions are the same as my first post about Shadow & Bone—I love the worldbuilding and “magic” of the Grisha. I felt the the Fold was very unique, as was the concept of the governmental structure, theory behind the magic (it’s science–manipulating matter–not magic), and the dystopian-fantasy genre of the book.
I hated the characters.
I didn’t mind them in book one. In book two, they got increasingly more obnoxious. In book three, I was done.
** spoilers below **
Book two introduced a new character, Prince Nikolai. I loved him. I loved him so much, and I shipped him 
and Alina so hard. He was clever, funny, and strategic. Alina seemed to like him, too. Until she ended with Mal. Good old jealous Mal.
Alina was kind of a puny character during the first book, and she didn’t get much better after that, though I could stomach her much more in the third book. By then she had accepted her fate and finally rose up to do something about it.
I rate the entire series a 4/5 on Goodreads, primarily because it was well-constructed and well-written. I just couldn’t stand the characters! If Leigh Bardugo comes out with any new books in the future, I will definitely pick them up.
lifebetweenreads.com 