“Tarrow’s decision is his own, but I’d rather sleep on a bed of sea urchins, or be hog-tied, hung upside down, and lowered into a tub full of stingfish.”
Yezi’s smile never left his face. “And if I insist?”
“The answer will still be no, and you’ll get a swift kick in the cod for good measure.”
This is the second book in the series, and even better than the first!
Be warned, this is very much the typical progression fantasy, with all the tropes those come with, so if you don’t like them, this isn’t for you.
If you however enjoy a good bit of military training, plenty of found family and friendships, an amazing bond between a human and his best friend, who happens to be a kraken, competition between teams, and some good fight and action scenes, this is definitely for you!
I adore how the main character is nice, and while we get the typical bully storyline, it’s not going the way I expected, and doesn’t take center stage like in so many other stories. He’s just a good kid, happy to give others a chance, and kinda assembled a band of “left over” people.
The camaraderie and loyalty that grew between them is a main draw for me. The focus is definitely on being better together, and helping each other out, instead of the often found drama and jealousy. It was simply a joy to read, and I’d love to be part of their team!
As you can see from the quote above, there’s also quite a lot of banter and humour to round the story off.
Yes, he, and especially him and the kraken together are quite OP (over powered), sometimes to a ridiculous amount, but to be honest, I wasn’t bothered by it, despite noticing.
It’s an easy and quick paced read, despite there being quite some world building and technically “slow” bits. As I found those bits interesting, they didn’t feel slow to me. I rather enjoyed learning about the magic, the world and the bond.
My only niggle is the sheer amount of Easter eggs and name cameos from the bookish community. While it is super cool to find myself in the book, it was so many names, and sometimes a lot of them in one scene, it did throw me out of the world at times. I felt more like being in one of the Facebook groups than in a secondary world.
This is a tiny niggle though, outside of that it was simply a whole lot of fun, and I blew through the pages!
I was so surprised when I saw the page count at the end, as I just devoured it in no time at all.
