A review by riverlasol
All of Our Demise by C.L. Herman, Amanda Foody

dark emotional tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated

5.0

oh my goodness, I am writing this review at around 11 pm after just finishing this book so my thoughts might be a little scattered but wow this was incredible. I finally got around to reading all of us villains this summer and I really enjoyed the concept and couldn’t wait to see how things got resolved in this book, but no matter how much I love the first book, nothing could’ve prepared for the sequel. even though I loved the first book, the world felt a little closed off because of how much of it centred around the champions and being inside of the tournament, so I absolutely adored how the sequel really opened up the world and we got to learn more about the fantasy setting, meet some new characters and even up the stakes beyond just the tournament/finding a way to end it. I admit there was a few moments where it felt like plot beats were dragged out a little longer than I would’ve expected, but that was probably just because the majority of this novel was very fast paced and full of heartbreaking twists. I also thought that the character development in this book was stellar. It was so satisfying to see how things that had started in the first book continued on and then got even more clear. And don’t even get me started on the romance. I thought the romance was done pretty convincingly in the first book, but in this one, it was just on a whole new level—Gavstair especially (is that their ship name?) is one of my new favourite ships and it’s not just because they’re queer because this ship in particular is absolutely enemies to lovers done right and I loved every second of it. I won’t be delving into spoilers so I will wrap this up here and just say that this book was even more bloody, brutal, and dramatic than the first of the duology and I truly loved it. I can definitely see myself re-reading this duology in the future and I highly highly recommend it to anyone who loves dark fantasy and wants a book with lots of twists and intensity. 
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