The writing is less subtle than in Sabriel and Lirael, lots of things stated that didn't need to be, with kind of repetitive narration at times. On the other hand, I was surprised more than once by some really great descriptions. 
 "As they climbed, Lirael came to understand that the cliff was not, as she had thought, a single almost vertical face of rough stone. It was actually composed of hundreds of faces of slipped rock, as if a sheaf of paper had been propped up and then many individual pages had slipped down." 
 I found the constant switches of perspective a little disorienting. The narrator is omniscient but focuses specifically on one character at a time, and sometimes when it changes to a new character you'll realize it's gone back in time a few seconds, so that what you're reading is happening simultaneously with what you just read before--but without any of those mid-page breaks that are usually used for that purpose. In any case, though, the action is compelling and I felt an attachment to the characters that makes me disappointed to think the next book might not be about the same people. I'm glad there's more to read.