I had really high hopes for this series, but as it turns out the enthusiasm I felt for the first novel wasn’t truly sustained throughout this one (or, for that matter, the third and final novel). I think it’s more of a ymmv type situation, though, so I’ll try my best to frame out my take.
First note: I have found a word for these novels along with a whole Wikipedia article! They are apparently called gaslamp fantasy/gaslight fantasy, to distinguish from using steampunk (which has a connotation more of the sci-fi futuristic elements).
Note that this review will, by design, have a lot of spoilers for Witchmark. To give a spoiler-free review, though: the first novel had a really strong, tense mystery at its core with a believable romance alongside. I feel like this novel has both elements as well (a mystery and a romance) but that neither are as compelling as the ones in Witchmark. Now, that might be a very high bar to reach. And I definitely found this book compelling enough to read in one day/potentially one sitting? It’s just that in comparison to Witchmark, which I didn’t want to end, I wanted to get to the end of this one so that I could see what the big mystery was. If that makes sense.
To the more spoiler-y bits, then.
This second book in The Kingston Cycle takes place almost immediately after the end of the prior novel). Miles is still recovering from nearly(?)/actually dying in his successful quest to shut down the enslaved-witch-and-soul-powered electricity network (‘aether’ in Polk’s universe) whose very existence is a shameful stain on a society more or less rife with them. Tristan has brought the entire Amaranthine army/court to Aeland as well, and they are NOT happy with how Aelanders have been harvesting souls for years to power their radios. Souls are supposed to come home to the Solace, which is the kingdom(?) of the Amaranthines. Aeland has committed some pretty heinous crimes, and someone has to pay.
My first issue is how the POV of the books shift so drastically, and to be honest that might just be my natural clingy-ness when it comes to having to learn and get used to new characters. While I wanted to have more Grace in the novel, I was sad to not also hear more from Miles and Tristan, who conveniently were elsewhere whenever Grace needed to do something where their help would be useful. But I think this is just me.
My second and largest issue was around the dramatic reveal of the tyranny of Aeland, or the villainy of the aristocracy, or whatever it was that made up the bulk of Grace’s sleuthing. I honestly can’t even remember what the dramatic reveal was, because it would be hard to top the reveal of Witchmark. The villain, too, I felt was pretty obvious even for me, a noted not-pay-attention-to-plot-details-er. It’s the classic SVU issue–the villain must be the best fleshed out secondary character, because otherwise the readers will feel cheated.
Don’t get me wrong–I love Grace as a character and was probably more into this novel than I would have been because it was focused on her. But it didn’t hold my attention the way I hoped it would.