Title: Days of Blood & Starlight (Daughter of Smoke & Bone #2)
Author: Laini Taylor
Date Read: June 12 2017
Published: November 6 2012 @ Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Genre: YA Fantasy
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
"I am one of billions. I am stardust gathered fleetingly into form. I will be ungathered. The stardust will go on to be other things someday and I will be free."
Days of Blood and Starlight, the middle book to Laini Taylor's fantastical trilogy, gave me everything that Daughter of Smoke and Bone was missing, and damn, I loved it.
The novel jumps ahead in time a little from the finale of the first book, reuniting Karou with the chimaera as tensions with the seraphim are building to an ultimate showdown. Again, the story blends elements of the other world, Eretz, with the lush background of the natural world; this time, the story is set predominantly in Morocco instead of Prague. Having learned about her past, and understanding the implications therein, Karou must abandon her ordinary life in Prague and choose a side between peace and vengeance.
So let's start with the part of this book I found most improved from the first: Karou and Akiva are apart. This sounds like a petty thing to say, and if you read my review of the first book, you know that I am petty toward Akiva anyway, but this dynamic honestly really worked for me. While in Daughter of Smoke & Bone I had an agonizingly difficult time trying to relate to Akiva being a traitor more or less because he thought Karou was pretty, I had a lot easier a time understanding his character and also forgiving some of his actions in this novel. You really start to understand that he really is largely powerless in this situation, and that makes him easier to relate to. His obsession with Karou is still there, it's just overshadowed by the bond between him and his siblings, and the reality of being a soldier for a cause you don't believe in. While he still did some untoward moping (and to be honest, I expected nothing less) I thought his character was overall stronger and fleshed out, especially when compared to the first book.
Again, I loved Zuzana and Mik, who provided some much needed levity to the more somber atmosphere of this book. Their cuteness is really over the top and obnoxious, but I honestly didn't even mind. I think that's something that Laini Taylor does really commendably; she has this ability to take tropes and clichés like the sassy best friend and make them really enjoyable and fresh through her stunning style of writing. You know that Zuzana and Karou are a kind of wish-fulfillment, but it's so well done that you don't mind.
But the main thing that I really loved about this sequel, characters aside, was the tone. While there were instances of action, and the tension was palpable, this was a much quieter, darker book than the first, and it really reflected the circumstances of Karou's life, but also the circumstances of her mental state.
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