First of all, I loved the post-war setting of this story. All the commentary on colonialism, imperialism, war and its aftereffects - spot on. Definitely one of my favourite parts of the story. 

I also really enjoyed the magic system, and how the ancestral magic of Iryans contrasted with the dragon magic of the Langlish. The religious lore was also really interesting, especially regarding the three Iryan deities. However, I do wish we had gotten to see magic explored more on page, especially with Elara learning a new magic system. 

The way the characters were built up and connected to each other was great as well. I felt for Elara and Faron's sisterly bond, even if it was understandably fraught at times. Both sisters also had a complicated relationship with Queen Aveline, which was interesting to explore, and I loved the little details we got about their backstories going to war together as children. 

The romance was a mixed bag for me. I really liked Faron and Reeve's relationship and how they navigated the longstanding tension between one another. Elara and Signey I was less invested in, maybe because they lacked the same degree of backstory and build-up. And I hugely appreciated the casual queer rep in this story. Forever something I love to see, especially in fantasy novels. 

The overall conflict was built up well, suitably high-stakes, and easy to get invested in, and I understood everything the characters did to achieve their ends. However, on a scene-to-scene level, the conflicts were usually very low-stakes. Obviously smaller, lower stakes conflicts are still important to a story, but this just ended up feeling like the overarching plot and individual scenes didn't match up in terms of their narrative weight for most of the story. I also felt that the focus of these smaller conflicts was often misplaced, especially where Elara was concerned. Late in the book, when she's concerned for people she's met since becoming a dragonrider and regards them as family, it doesn't land emotionally for me as a reader because I didn't actually see much interaction and bonding between her and the people in question. 

I also have mixed feelings about the climax. On the one hand, I liked some of the twists, particularly in terms of two characters essentially swapping circumstances, and another ending up as good as dead but maybe saveable. On the other hand, another major twist didn't land for me because I can't be shocked by a betrayal when the traitor was heavily broadcast as untrustworthy throughout the entire book. It's not a case of "I trusted you because I didn't know who else to turn to and now it has inevitably backfired." Instead, it read more as, "I was wary at first but grew to really trust you and now it turns out it was all a trick and a trap." It just didn't land for me. 

The fight scenes were also not my favourite, unfortunately. They tended to be pretty glossed over, which is frustrating knowing that the core characters in the story are women who went to war as children and are now back to war as adults. A lot of tension was also killed by one character we had never really seen in any kind of fight before taking on the most powerful enemy almost single-handedly and doing very, very well, to the point that I was confused when the book ended without the enemy being defeated. 

Overall, this was a really promising book with a strong premise, great characters, and interesting magic and politics, but it ultimately landed a bit flat for me.