"The Shadow Reader" was one of the best debut last year. That's why I am sad to announce that the sequel let me down. 
 "The Shattered Dark" starts almost immediately after events of the first book. The rebels are now in the Silver Palace trying to hold their positions and catch remnants. 
 The reason I was displeased with this book, was because it was very erratic. Whole book consisted of running, ambushes and fights. And that left no time for character growth, for deepening the world-building, or just for simple dialogs (which there were so few). There wasn't enough of Kyol. And McKenzy's relationship with Aren seemed stuck. 
 I think that the plot lacked purpose, a mission. In the first book rebels were on the offence with the goal to overthrow the king which meant they were always planning, scheming, truing to think of some ways to do it. But in this book rebels are on the defense. They don't have a goal beside to hold their position one fight at a time. Which left this book with a lot of disconnected fights and no mission to bound them into thrilling quest. 
 A lot of reviews said that this book ends with a cliffhanger. I actually disagree. Of course some story lines were left open for the future installments, but main problems were solved. 
 I really hope that now when the worst of the war is out of the way the third book will be more paced and will manage to claim the glory of "The Shadow Reader".