Soul of the Sword (Julie Kagawa) is a fun adventure

This will contain some very minor spoilers for Shadow of the Fox, the first book in this series. I read the first of this series, Shadow of the Fox last year. I enjoyed it but felt, at the time, that the story around the characters was ultimately less interesting than the story of our main leads - Yumeko and (to a lesser extent) Tatsumi because most of the ‘adventuring party’ joined quite late. As a result, we learned considerably less about them. Daisuke had some foreshadowing, at least, but Reika joined right at the capital, just as we were going into the end game. Okame also grated on me, with his jokes oftentimes falling flat or calling himself a ‘ronin dog’ every other page. The book was overall positive though, especially the ending sequence. The second book in the series takes what I liked about the first one, and improves it on every front. The party is together at the outset of the book, meaning that we get a chance to grow close to them. Okame’s comedic relief lands better…