Whilst I enjoyed this book, I got lost a couple of times with the character's names; the various alliances and the warring factions. It's possibly due to the fact that I read this out of sequence, but I wanted to read this one after I read Zarek's story. I've not reached the Nick story yet either, so that didn't help. 
 3 stars is a bit mean, but The "never-ending" torture in book 1 was truly overdone and prevents a 4 star rating. 
 Looking forward to reading more of the series