“First of all I want to just add a note about the previous title “The sunbearer trials” my main gripe with the previous novel was a non binary character Ocelo who used they/them for the entirety of the book was he/himed on two pages. And on the last page the first diose Sol was he’d, one of the characters made a point to say how it was cool Sol was non-binary.
In this book Ocelo only uses they/them pronouns which leads me to think it was a mistake missed by the editor. And Sol was he/himed 3 times at the end of this book so maybe make a point to clarify they use both he/they? Overall I did enjoy Celestial monsters and I think more than the previous book. This book has more of the high-risk high-stakes atmosphere that I missed in the sunbearer trials. I enjoyed the fight scenes/battles a lot more. I did find a few times that as a reader I felt a few too many steps ahead of the characters with the solution to the fight and it was almost annoying waiting for them the catch up. I would’ve liked to get to know Yucca and Paz a bit more but I understand the time restraints with that. I really loved the deaf/disabled representation of Dezi but he wasn’t in the forefront of this book. The romance between the mc and romantic interest was a bit meh unfortunately, they were on an adventure so it didn’t need to be a priority but it felt like they’d lost all chemistry/pining from the last book. Spoilerwould’ve liked to see more anguish/remorse from Xio because the flip-flopping wasn’t super in character from what we know of them. there were a couple of over used phrases too like the previous book but honestly a second editor would easily fix this issue. “
Extra notes to the publisher, it would’ve been cool to have a recap list of the characters and their diose parents/powers at the start of the book just to familiarise yourself. I felt that the phrases buckling their knees and gripped like a vise (vice in uk) were a tad overused. And the word neutral was misspelt as nuetral. And while I understand the Teo chapters were from his perspective they weren’t his internal monologue so the unknowing misgendering of Xio didn’t feel great to read.