The Quest for Cush

I often find that I don't love sequels as much as the first book in a series, and The Quest for Cush follows that pattern. I really, really loved the first book in the series, Imaro. Some of the things that I loved about Imaro are present in this sequel. Imaro, the titular character, continues to evolve as a person. The book is well-written adn introduces new, engaging characters. There are some exciting battle scenes and the mythology underpinning the various antagonists is vivid and interesting. Really, my biggest complaint about this sequel is that it doesn't have the same episodic structure as the first book. In the first book, each chapter functioned like a separate episode, often an almost self-contained adventure with a set-up, rising action, and then a resolution. In this book, there are still discrete adventures, but they go on much longer and sometimes the energy (or maybe just my attention span) would begin to flag, and I'd find myself having to backtrack occasionally to remind myself of who the different characters were, or what the motivation was for a particular action. It wasn't terrible, and the book wasn't boring, it just wasn't as punchy as the first. Additionally, unlike the first, some of the adventuares didn't really seem essential to the larger story arc. There was one adventure towards the end of this book that actually left a bad taste in my mouth - it doesn't not deal with some cahracters' physical disabilities well, the bad guys were vanquished (somehwat improbably) by a sanctimonious pep talk, and the whole episode could easily have been skipped. That being said, I still liked this book and am enjoying this series overall.