A solid beginning to a prequel series. It kept my interest the whole way, even though ultimately I knew what the outcome had to be, since it's a prequel.

The central characters were believable to me as children and teens. Of course that was some time ago for me, so make of that what you will. There were some YA / coming-of-age topics, but I would not say they were central to the story. There is some violence, but it is not too gory / repetitive. I respected the way the author conveys the effects of violence on the characters, both as doers and receivers.

Some of the "side-quests" in the last third of the book could be taken either as homage to traditional fairy stories, or as cliché, depending on how cranky the reader is feeling.

My overall impression was that although the Christian(?) Church was the overarching villain, this did not feel as much like a secularist screed as "His Dark Materials". There was some pointed material about the mechanics of (creeping?) totalitarian rule that I thought made a broader political point.