The book still suffers from occassional translation awkwardness and there's still a lot of over explaining, but since we're now in a setting in which people (read: nobles) speak very...indirectly and without obviously showing their intention, it feels a lot less out of place. I took a while to get through each volume in part 1, but this one I have been devouring. A lot more stuff happens, new places and characters are explored, and the tension is much higher!

I'm also noticing that the series is putting an increasing emphasis on characters besides Myne having their own aspirations that they shoot for. Things that many other fantasy books make mundane, like Tuuli looking for ways to become a better seamstress or Lutz's troubles with his families when he wants to be a merchant, are deemed important enough to become the focus too. It's not just Myne's crazy rise to book making power, everyone else's life stories matter just as much no matter how little they will impact history or change the world - because everyone deserves to be the hero of their own story for a little while. Everyone has their own thing going on, and that just makes the world and the characters feel so alive.