Second in a Duology

 Heart of the Sun Warrior by Sue Lynn Tan 

This was not near as strong as the first book in this duology and I'm not sure if that's because I was so enthralled with book 1 that my expectations were too high for this one or if it really was just not as good. I'm not saying it was not good or not enjoyable, just that it wasn't as good as book 1. There were aspects of this story that I was not invested in and I found myself wandering away mentally; it was long winded in parts. What should have felt epic and sweeping was instead slogging. While I understood Xingyin and her animosity toward the Empress and how that colored her relationship with Liwei I was also irritated with her for not having that conversation with him to begin with. Then there's Wenzhi; he betrayed her and is trying to get back in her good graces and she wants to trust him but can't but does. And they all have to be allies but the men don't trust each other because of jealousy. And then her long dead father is not actually dead. And the Emperor is being usurped by a mortal made immortal who is crazy and he is building an unkillable army of soldiers who used to be soldiers but have been reanimated. They also have to go to the Phoenix Kingdom and ask the sole surviving sunbird for help. Wenzhi becomes king, then dies. Liwei takes over as emperor once they defeat the usurper because his father can't do it anymore. Then Wenzhi is reborn and she meets him but he doesn't remember her, but that's ok because they have the rest of his mortal life together, and he will get his memories back when he dies. So, it should have been good: it was full of action and adventure, but it just didn't live up to expectation. I still enjoyed it, but not as much as I wanted to.