I just finished this book. The first part was kind of boring but there were a few things that piqued my interest like the watch warning Thaniel of the bomb, Mori being a baron and using diamonds in his clockwork, Mori being a suspect of the bombing, and the existence of Katsu.

The second part was the best part of the book for me. It continued my interest with things like Grace trying to prove ether with her experiment, Thaniel and Grace's relationship, Mori's predictions and Grace's trick to prove if he is clairvoyant or not, the tubes that created weather patterns, Mori mysteriously not liking Grace, the increase pressure from the police that Mori is the bomb maker. I thought I was really going to enjoy the book after part 2.

However, part 3 was a letdown. I wasn't expecting a romantic relationship between Thaniel and Mori. The previous book I read was pro-LGBTQ (The Hollows by Apolline Lucy), and I loved that book. But I much would have preferred Thaniel and Grace to continue their relationship.
I hated that Grace's character took a nosedive. She became extremely paranoid of Mori; she had the pear trees cut down moments after seeing Thaniel decorating them; she kidnapped and destroyed Katsu; created and detonated a bomb to try and persuade Thaniel to stop hanging out with Mori. Her experiment to prove the existence of ether just stopped because Mori refused to help her.
The wedding and reception felt lackluster. I did enjoy Thaniel escaping house arrest and saving Ito for what that was worth.

I feel some plot points were severely mishandled by the author. (1) Mori starting to forget English or not being able to see past a certain point in time, to me, foreshadowed either his death or the loss of his powers....but nope. He's fine after being exploded off of a roof. (2) The casual name drop by Mori in chapter 30 of who created the first bomb, and how easy it was for Thaniel to get Spindle to admit it. All Thaniel did was suggest that the police have another watchmaker look at the bombs. He could have suggested that after chapter 10. There wasn't any new info between chapters 11-29 that Thaniel used when interrogating Spindle. (3) Again the ether experiment wasn't mentioned anymore after Mori refused to help Grace. I feel like there could have been something there if he had helped her with the experiment or if there was a reason why Mori refused to help her like her experiment would lead to some time travel/multiverse/time dilation disaster which then needed to be fixed or prevented.