A review by rainywave
The Hidden Palace by Helene Wecker

2.5

While I still love Helene Wecker's style of writing, and I suppose the previous book did lend itself viable for a sequel of some sorts, this was not what I wanted out of these two characters. The tone of the book, I feel, basically walks back the friendship of the two characters in many ways and, one could argue, has a very weird anti-exogamy tone to it. I think readers could understand that if Chava and Ahmad continued their relationship, that there would be issues due to their magical natures and personalities, but I didn't appreciate the fatalistic approach to their relationship. 

Apparently this is meant to be the second book in a trilogy, so I could see the breaking of their relationship as a standard "second book low point", but with it standing as is now, it truly makes me sad to see the two of them separate and distant now. I'd prefer to just keep the ending to the original book.