We begin this installment with the continued absence of Blue's mother (which Blue isn't handling well). From there, readers are presented with an influx of new characters to keep track of, including but not limited to Mr. Malory, Mr. Malory's dog, Henry Cheng, Jesse, Piper, Gwenllian, and Artemus... the significance of most being nebulous, but will hopefully become clear by the final book. 
 The pacing seemed to drag more than the first two. Or rather, the pacing was actually steady, but the overall tension was lower. I wasn't often clear on what was at stake, or why there should be any sense of urgency outside of developments toward the end involving Greenmantle and his well manicured yet exceedingly psychotic wife. 
 The Gansey/Blue relationship felt like the primary focal point, and plot progress sort of stalled in the wake of that. On the upshot, the sensual tension between them and the "impossible" doom of the romance and lingering love triangle. This foreseeable development continues to be gradual, handled with a sweet sort of agony I expect many readers to find enthralling. 
 "Blue was perfectly aware that it was possible to have a friendship that wasn't all-encompassing, that wasn't blinding, deafening, maddening, quickening. It was just that now that she'd had this kind, she didn't want the other." 
 Downsides: 
 -Noah seemed to fade from relevancy--an issue I hope is remedied in the final installment. (Otherwise, I'm not clear on why he's still in the picture at all.) 
 -In less than a week Piper went from a shallow, tepid, sociopathic arm-candy to some sort of full-on mob boss. The ease of her success was sudden, to say the least, and befuddlingly unexplained. 
 -This book felt notably different from the first two--and not just because we lost Ronan's POV and had to go back and forth between Adam and Blue (who are, unfortunately, not my favorite characters.) Readers keep being told that Ronan has changed to the point of unrecognizable, but I couldn't share that opinion. If anything, Ronan has felt the most constant, without losing character development traction. A close runner up would be Adam, who finally grew somewhat, but nowhere near as much as I would have expected given his circumstances and support structure. Pride can only explain so much stubbornness (3 books worth?) before it becomes an obnoxious encumbrance that's difficult to sympathize with. 
 I'm sorry to say my overall enjoyment of this series seems to be on the decline. Will I still read the last one? Yes, absolutely. I'm too hopeful for a satisfying resolution to a number of mysteries.