A review by serenityribbon
The House of Binding Thorns by Aliette de Bodard

5.0

This takes all the amazing elements of the first book, cleans up the elements that didn't work so well and combines them with new ones to make a corker of a book. The dragon kingdom was one of my favourite bits from the first book and it gets much expanded and elaborated on here. The PoV's are wonderful and I also liked how this book went more into the lives of those outside the house system. Asmodeus was more in focus here and I feel like I understand more about what makes him tick. And the power dynamics! I can't say too much without going directly into spoilers but the way de Bodard handles the power imbalance between Thuan and Asmodeus and how that changes over the book is some powerful writing done in a fairly short space.