Book Review: Stranger Skies (Drowned Gods #2) by Pascale Lacelle

Rating: ★★★
Audience: YA Fantasy
Length: 608 pages
Author: Pascale Lacelle
Publisher: McElderry Books
Release Date: November 5th, 2024
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

Ninth House meets The Hazel Wood in this riveting sequel to the New York Times bestselling dark academia fantasy Curious Tides, following Emory, Baz, Romie, and Kai on their desperate quests through space and time! Opening locked doors has a price—even for those who hold a key. After going through the door that called to them both in dreams, Emory and Romie find themselves in the the same verdant world written of in Song of the Drowned Gods, albeit a twisted, rotting version of it. A sinister force has awoken with their arrival, intent on destruction as it spills across realms, and now Emory and Romie must stop it before it reaches their own shores. Meanwhile, Baz and Kai are desperate to follow their friends through the door to other worlds, but a mishap pulls them back in time instead—where they come face to face with Cornus Clover himself, famed author of Song of the Drowned Gods. Stuck together in the past, they must navigate a very different Aldryn as they unravel the school’s darkest secrets. Across time and worlds, Emory, Romie, Baz, and Kai find their fates eerily interwoven with the heroes from Clover’s book. But when stories can’t be trusted, friendships are put to the test, and deadly enemies are not always as they seem, they must decide who gets to be a hero—and who is desperate enough to see themselves become a villain.

SO BORED.

I thought this was the most unnecessarily long book and honestly I still feel confused about the trajectory and plot and most things in between. I was reading Rhythm of War at the same time as this and I don’t know if my love for that book over shadowed this so much that I just never got into it.

The romances were written well and I liked the characters. Those were never the issue. The dark academia aspects disappeared and it fell into a time travel fantasy, which is FINE, but honestly, not my favorite.

Overall audience notes: