Siege and Storm took me quite a while to get through. I went back and forth a few times between whether I should give this 3 stars or 4 stars, but I settled on 4 because I really did end up getting drawn in heavily in the last third of the book. Middle books in a trilogy are always tricky because they have to act as a bridge between where the characters/story began and where they are ultimately headed. I do like that we got to see quite a bit of darkness and tragedy, and see the effect it has on Alina. Her inner struggles were really what made this book win me over. 
 Seeing how far she has come over the course of the story is what has kept me interested in continuing the series. She began as such a scared and sad and helpless little girl, and seeing her struggle with those feelings of inadequacy and that image, and watching her try to be something more than that and come into herself, is truly the thing that keeps this story moving along. The action of the plot is a lot of explaining what's going on and just time passing, but Alina's character arc is where the majority of the action lies, until some larger plot event occurs. 
 My main issue with the series so far is that it does sort of stagnate sometimes, especially because Alina isn't always likeable, and her actions are frequently frustrating to read about, so in those moments it's hard to keep trudging through when very little else is happening. The other characters exist primarily to just affect Alina's story and character, and don't seem to have a fully-developed feeling independent of Alina. The only character that had some independence from her impact was The Darkling, but in this book he spends most of the second half as just a scary bogeyman. Mal seems to be developing as a character towards the second half, but we don't see enough of that process as the reader, because we only see it through Alina's eyes and in the ways that it has consequences in her life. This is of course, Alina's story, so of course these choices do make sense, but I wish that we could see some additional world-building plots other than random and rare large events. It almost feels like the world outside of Alina's bubble doesn't exist sometimes and that kind of makes outside forces that do occur, feel too forced or convenient. The plot events in the first book felt a little more natural than they do in this one, but Alina is much more complex in this book, so if the next one just takes both of those positives from these two, and adds in more complexities to surrounding characters, then it'll be fantastic. 
 However, despite my misgivings about all that, overall I really do enjoy the series and I'm so intrigued and fascinated by this world the author has built. I have already purchased the third book and Six of Crows (which takes place in the same universe), because I am so interested in seeing the world get more complex as time goes on.