What a ride. The second installment in the Wormwood Trilogy certainly packed a punch, dialing up the story, the action, and the POVs. Seriously, I was shocked in the last quarter of the book, we were introduced to a brand new POV. For the majority of this book, I was worried it was going to be a 'second book slump' of the series due to the seemingly endless vignettes from the 5+ POVs that felt like they were leading nowhere. I was concerned that this book was only going to serve as an introduction to the finale, however the last third of the book really connected the narratives together into a very interesting overarching story.

While the pacing of this book was lacking, I found the characters to be interesting. I wouldn't necessarily say the characters had a lot of growth or were especially dynamic, but I found them to be realistic, consistent, and fun. I do hope that I get to see a bit more character development in the next book though.

The moral dilemma in this book was very compelling and I hope it will be fleshed out further. The story took an interesting political/philosophical turn which I wasn't expecting. I was surprised with how quickly and 'nicely' this book wrapped up with the final 20 or so pages feeling like they rushed to a nice conclusion. But given how nicely the story ended, there are a few interesting avenues the final book can go down, which I'll be interested to see.

I'm excited to finally pick up the last book and see where this all goes!