I’m keeping this short: overall this had an easier feel than the first; there was zero struggle on my part to get into it at all. Their world after all is still different with magical creatures and fantastical feats, plus a creature/best friend type that shows up (a manticore!) All that said, perhaps the ease at which I got into it maybe a negative:>The complexities of who Naji was and what he had to do, then Ananna and who she was for him/ to him: it’s all muted somehow because a lot of what happens in here is Ananna and her feelings that may or may not be reciprocated. >Now were we talking YA love story, this wouldn’t be such a bad thing, but this one picks up from a story of an assassin and a pirate each with particular strengths that had them feeling “new” to me. All her ‘I love’s him but he doesn’t love me’ was not the Ananna that I remember. The Pirate’s Wish could have been better, but bits of this entertained me, particularly the connections beyond the romantic sort of those between a mythical creature and a girl, those between friends and then issues of loyalty. Then the magical world of the Mists and his desert, then her and the sea… then more unexpected worlds I’d not even considered. Wildly imaginative all of that, but a whole lot of lovey-dovey ordinariness that had me feeling The Pirate’s Wish less and less… ‘til that awesome ending of course. 3/5
