Hello friends, happy Monday – I hope you’re all doing well! Today I’m posting my review of the sequel to Song of the Current, Whisper of the Tide by Sarah Tolcser.

You can read my review of book one: Song of the Current

Whisper of the Tide by: Sarah Tolcser: Caro has spent her life waiting for her call from the river god, but when the sea god comes calling, she’s not quite prepared for what the god has in store. Caro has spent the last little while helping Markos reclaim the throne of Akhaia, but with no family left, Markos has no allies. He’s then forced into a political marriage in order to gain his throne. This leaves Caro with the choice of her love for him, or the fate of the Akhaian people, while also risking defying the sea god. This novel closed out this duology really nicely. At first the reader wasn’t sure we were going to get a good ending; with not many pages left and what felt like a lot to wrap up, the suspicions were high on what we would get, but this certainly pulled through. Tolcser managed to genuinely surprise her readers and turn things around at the last minute, which left the reader on the edge of their seat. Over the course of this novel, the events that happened in the first started to come back – some of them were more relevant to this book’s plot than others, but this definitely took characters, especially our main one to new heights. The overall story was good; it felt more geared towards the romance plot than the fantasy one, but in the end they both came together to perfection. We couldn’t have one plot without the other, or else the ending wouldn’t have worked the way that it did. The reader enjoyed the adventures, the magic and the misdirects, the deceit and revenge plots; the romance ones were strong, too, but the reader didn’t quite care so much for them. The whole river/sea god plot was so interesting and fascinating. The world building was definitely better in this one, but we still wish we’d gotten more – like that plot alone could have been a cool series. As for our characters, it was good to see new ones join the cast to help shake things up; it was also good to see old characters come back to give a little shake to things too. It felt like all of them combined really rounded and fleshed this story out. For the most part, the characters felt deeply developed, while also being very connected to one another in some way or another which helped to shape each of them in their own ways. Some were more memorable than others, some for more devious things than others, but memorable nonetheless. Our main characters really went through a lot in this and it taught them quite a bit about themselves, which was good to read; it showed growth and maturity. Overall, this was a fun, duology that kept the reader on their toes.