My excitement from the end of Godkiller was somewhat dampened when I opened the sequel and all the characters they’d worked so hard to defeat in book one were still around! And then the three humans who bonded so beautifully in book one spent most of book two in totally different places working towards different ends. I guess this is what you call “middle book syndrome.” 

Also Inara’s big reveal was pretty obvious by the time it was finally spelled out.

A stellar showing for number two of a planned trilogy. 

I love this book! Inara's growth and Kissen's changing perspectives are all refreshing. I especially love the Arren/Elogast POV's. They understand each other so well that fighting against each other feels like a chess game that neither really want to play. Elogast was my favorite character in this book, while Kissen was my favorite in the last. 

I was very excited to get my hands on this book because I loved Godkiller. However, Sunbringer let me down and I struggled a lot to get through it. I had to resort to listening to this as an audio book with 2x speed even though I bought the book to really enjoy the reading experience. Hah. That didn't happen. Instead Sunbringer took me months to finish, whereas I normally read multiple books a week. I had to take breaks from this book to have the patience to trot through this one.

The main reasons why this book was a flop for me are that all the main characters are separated

until the very end

and the plot feels like a drawn-out middle book paving the road for a sequel's epic final boss battle. 🙄

I almost always hate when the main group of characters is separated for a big portion of a book, and that rings true here as well. The separation makes me unmotivated to keep reading because it creates many differing plot lines that we get only glimpses at at a time. Moreover, I crave to see the characters interact with each other and their relationships shift, and while being separated that obviously can't happen.

All the way until the middle of the book I only was properly interested in Kissen's plot line, the others feeling too stagnant, self-centered or depressing. Kissen is in a bad place but still she pushes forward and has agency. After the halfway mark there's also interesting reveals about Ina.

The big lines of the plot move very slow, even if there are smaller sub plots to follow meanwhile. The whole gist of this book can be summarized as "

don't fight amongst yourselves, you fools, the big bad god is reborn and will be an even stronger enemy at your door very soon

."

With the group of characters

reunited

and a huge threat right around the corner, I am still interested to continue with this series. I hope the sequel will be out soon, and that it will fit my tastes and hopes for it better.

Can’t wait for the third book!