Waaay too much romancey sex and feelings. I'm not sure that the endless descriptions of 'love' added anything to the story. ( )

Continuing my re-read in the Symphony of Ages so I can finally finish the series. A lot happens in this book. Heartache, death, secrets revealed and re-covered. Dragons! Definitely a middle book, but I still enjoy it immensely.‬ ( )

Trigger Warnings: Sex, mild language.

4.75 I absolutely loved this book. The world is so vivid and its history is so just as interesting as its peoples. Rhapsodie's character is so well developed. Her perspectives were clear and consistent throughout the entire story and relatable. She's a loveable character with a huge heart. A few things bugged me like how everyone had a crush on the main character how unbelievably beautiful she was, but the reasons behind it and the way it helped develop the character was worth it. The relationships in this book seemed like they could be real and not all happy go lucky, which was nice although it took up a lot of the plot. ( )

I liked the first book, the story line, the world and the characters - although I found Rhapsody a bit annoying. In this book, I still like the story line, the world and most of the characters. Rhapsody can be very annoying and some of the characters are just clueless. In addition, an entire romance novel had been embedded in the book. There are long, tedious discussions about:
1. How beautiful Rhapsody is and what nice clothes she has
2. How handsome Ashe is
3. Their feelings for each other - deep love, confusion, misunderstanding - they've got it all.
If the romance to action ratio remains the same I probably won't make it through the third book even though I would like to know how the story ends. ( )

I found this book decidedly more tedious the second time around, some 20 years after my first reading. Still, it advanced the story, and it was nice to see some plot points resolve themselves. ( )