"Hero. Foreigner. Queen. Elisa, at the age of seventeen, is all three. And all three draw enemies. Faced with assassins, court politics, and the threat of civil war, Elisa despairs of being the ruler her people need. Her only hope is the Godstone. She must master its power once and for all. She finds clues hidden in a long forgotten--and forbidden--scripture. Accompanied by a one-eyed warrior, an enemy defector, and the man she is falling in love with, Elisa takes a leap of faith and crosses an ocean in search of the ultimate source of the Godstone's power. But her faith has always had a price, and doing the right thing might mean giving up the power she desperately needs. And it might mean giving up the man she desperately loves. Rae Carson continues the epic story begun in The Girl of Fire and Thorns with a novel that is remarkable, adventurous, and even more romantic than the first"--
I didn't love this one quite as much as the first. It's good, the plot unfolding in an interesting manner and progressing in a reasonable way from the last novel. The characters are good enough and well developed.
There's nothing bad to say about this story, but there's also nothing amazing to say about it. There wasn't a heart piercing turn of phrase and I didn't fall in love with any of the characters. There writing style wasn't beautiful and the plot wasn't engrossing. But it was all very good and very well executed. I feel weird saying all that, like I'm trying to find things to not like. It's just [a:Rae Carson|4074051|Rae Carson|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1284052029p2/4074051.jpg] is a very talented writer and there's a lot to like, and I'm having to explain, to myself more than anything else, why I didn't give it 4 stars because there was just nothing I loved.
Except maybe the last five pages which I read a couple times. And possibly Hector's tormented perspective of power which was very interesting. And maybe Elisa's character development. I liked who she was in the last 5 pages a lot and think it bodes well for the next book.
