When I first started this book, I found it to be a little slow and not quite as immersive as I had wanted. As I read on and got further into the story, however, I became to enjoy it a lot more. The world building of this fantasy land is very well done, with all of the information given only when it is needed and never having any info-dumps. The world is well developed and yet not overwhelming. I have never read a fantasy story that takes place in a world such as this, it was very unique. The book has a very western cell to it and has ghosts as a central plot line, two things that I was not expecting going into it. Since these two things are not very common in YA fantasy, especially in conjunction, I would say this is a very unique story that I would recommend to fans of those plot elements. I did grow closer to the main characters, and I thought that Aster was a good choice for POV, although I wished we had gotten to know the other girls even better than we did. I was first a little let down when I started reading, but by the end of this book I was not disappointed at all. I would encourage readers to stick it out and wait until about 100 pages in before making a judgement, because that is where the story really starts to take off.