This had ups and downs. The love interest has a backbone. The protagonist is good with sharing information (after a bit of nudging) so we have scenes of collaboration rather than the "I must protect you by keeping secrets" cliche. On the other hand, the book offers us "A sorcerer can't hurt you if he can't see you" just a few pages after the lecture on all the ways sorcerers can detect human beings. (Life mages sensing life energy, air mages detecting your breath, etc.) It doesn't inspire me to trust the author with details.
The protagonist stole Harry Dresden's "raised by an abusive dark mage" backstory. This version goes deeper into how dark wizards think -- they're explicitly anarcho-libertarian "anything I can get away with" assholes. Sociopaths training new generations of sociopaths ad infinitum. Which, okay, it's psychologically plausible; but it's also unpleasant to wade through. And then the good guys are pragmatic, inconsistently ethical, occasionally outright bastards (just because you're not a sociopath doesn't mean you're not power-mad), and are in the process of rolling over for the dark mages because they can't be bothered. (Even in his worst days, Dresden had more friends.) Not sure I want to read three more books of this.