I'm a bad American SF and Fantasy fan — I bought this from England.

Was it worth it?

Yep.

This picks up from Dragonfly Falling and tosses the main characters into new settings — Solarno, a Lowlands spider city; Jerez, a skater kinden city in the Empire (where the rule of the Wasps is lightly held) and Sarnesh, with a much different view and more detail than before.

The bulk of the book concerns the pursuit of the Heart of the Darakyon and trying to win allies from Solarno and around the Exalsee. It also concerns Stenwold Maker's delicate negotiations with the (remaining) powers of the Lowlands to form an alliance against the Wasp Empire. This is very tricky in the face of the new miracle weapon of the snapbow that Stenwold has as well…

Like its predecessors, its a fun read. Its not great literature (nor does it pretend to be), but its fun. Its got steampunk elements (like airships and clockwork powered ornithopters), magic and an epic storyline. I do miss the politics of the setting that permeated the earlier books, but it may return in later ones.

And Adam — by fine tradition of "Why Reading?" you mean the tradition of people ending up in Reading and then asking 'Why?' ?

And a fine tradition it is.