#CBR9 Book 56: "A Court of Wings and Ruin" by Sarah J. Maas

Page count: 720 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Spoiler warning! This review is going to contain spoilers for earlier books in the series, and possibly some mild ones for the content of this book too. If you're not caught up, you probably want to skip this review for now. Come back when you've read the books, they're worth your time if you like action-packed fantasy.

The beginning of this book finds Fayre back at the Spring court, after Tamlin made a bargain with the the High King and had her bond with Rhysand broken. What only a select few know, is that Fayre is now High Lady of the Night Court and only pretending to have been spell-bound and traumatised for all her months away. She's back with Tamlin to gather as much information as possible about his alliance with the High King and the future invasion of Prythian and the human realm. Using all the cunning and guile she possesses, she slowly manages to undermine Tamlin's standing with his own men, in order to destabilise the forces of the Spring Court. She also ends up neutralising some rather unpleasant emissaries of the High King, before returning to her home at the Night Court to further plan for war.

Unless Fayre and Rhysand can rally more of the various Faerie courts to their side, they are badly outnumbered and in no position to save Prythian and the humans who are all facing destruction. The ruthless, uncaring and cruel facade that Rhysand has presented to the world for most of his adult life isn't exactly helpful in trying to curry favours and win allies. Even if the many different minor courts lay aside their differences and unite against the High King, they may be outclassed. To gain stronger supernatural allies, Fayre may need to risk her very sanity.

Fayre grows and changes so much over the course of these three books. She was always brave and tenacious, willing to risk herself for those she loves. In the first book, she learned that maybe not all fae are vicious, cruel and untrustworthy, she fell in love and had to go through hell, even sacrificing her own life to save the man she loved. In the second book, she learned that sometimes your first love doesn't last forever, and trauma and hardship can kill a relationship that isn't strong enough. She discovered supportive friendships and rebuilt herself into a stronger, more resilient person, learning to use her new and unexpected powers and growing comfortable with who she had become. She found a new, stronger love and a collection of people who were just as close to her as her human family had once been. In this third book, it's nice to see that no matter how far she's come, Fayre isn't always infallible and she makes a couple of judgement calls early on that come back to have serious repercussions later in the story. She's forced to admit that she was wrong and readjust her views accordingly.

In the second book, it is obvious that war is coming, but in this book, it's mostly all about how to fight it. As well as trying to help Rhysand and his inner circle gather allies, Fayre needs to tend to her sisters, who are deeply changed and traumatised by what happened to them at the end of the previous book.

After so much build-up, it felt a little bit convenient when the final battle was pretty much solved by a deus ex machina, with very little emotional or personal cost to anyone. While it wasn't that I desperately wanted anyone to die, it felt a little bit too convenient the way everything wrapped up. Apparently, while the main storyline of these three books is finished off in this book, there will be other books to follow, and since I'm very interested in seeing a lot of the supporting characters find their own HEAs, I suspect I will be reading them as well. As I mentioned in my last review, I'm enjoying these books so much more than the Throne of Glass books, and will happily revisit Prythian in future instalments.

Judging a book by its cover: I really like the shade of green they've chosen for the background of this book, but otherwise they've stuck to the central theme of having Fayre front and centre. Eagle-eyed readers may notice that her tattoo is on the other hand - which to those in the know is significant. Even wearing a fancy dress, this Fayre is not going to go about unarmed, hence the wicked-looking dagger.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

#CBR9 Book 55: "A Court of Mist and Fury" by Sarah J. Maas

Page count: 626 pages
Rating: 5 stars

Spoiler warning! This is book 2 in a series, and it's impossible for me to review this book without giving some spoilers for the book that came before. If you haven't read the first book, A Court of Thorns and Roses, you should maybe give this review a miss until you're caught up. There will also be some spoilers for this book, because it's impossible to talk about what happens in it without them.

Feyre is back at the Spring Court a vastly changed woman, after her trials at Amarantha's court Under the Mountain. While Tamlin and his court try to shield and shelter her from everything unpleasant, she's still plagued with horrible nightmares reminding her of what she had to do to survive, and getting used to her new fae body, with its added speed and strength is also difficult for her. It's very obvious that Tamlin and the others just want to forget what happened, and absolutely no one wants to talk about the horrors they experienced. Tamlin just ignores Fayre's obvious distress, hoping it will go away eventually. He wants her to think of pleasant things, like planning their wedding. He also wants to keep her safely locked away in his house, making sure nothing will ever hurt her again, even though just the thought of enclosed spaces makes Fayre frantic.

As her wedding day approaches, Fayre is filled with doubts about whether this is at all a good idea. How can someone as horrible and broken and tainted as her marry Tamlin and rule with him in the Spring Court? Her left hand and arm are still inked with the tattoo reminding her of her bargain with Rhysand, High Lord of the Night Court, but he's not come to collect on the promise that Fayre spend a week a month in his court. Until her wedding day, that is. Tamlin is furious, and Fayre isn't even ready to admit to herself even how relieved she is when Rhysand shows up to spirit her away.

Having seen his behaviour Under the Mountain, Fayre is not sure what to expect from Rhysand or his demands on her time. He doesn't seem to want anything but her company, and sometimes, not even that, leaving her alone for long stretches at at time when she visits. He insists that she rest and eat to build her strength up, seemingly worried about how thin she's grown and how exhausted she always seems. He understands about her nightmares, because he has them too, and has felt her distress through the bond they share due to their agreement. Every time she returns to the Spring Court, Tamlin carefully questions her to find out the secrets of the Night Court, and initially Fayre is quite happy to spy. As the months pass, and it becomes more and more obvious how differently the two men are treating her, Fayre begins to change her mind. When she went through the trials Under the Mountain to free Tamlin, she believed he was her true love. Could she have been wrong?

I really wasn't entirely sure what to expect from A Court of Mist and Fury, but I had heard some things that made me unhappy, especially because of all the hardship and pain Fayre went through in A Court of Thorns and Roses to both prove her love for and eventually rescue not only Tamlin, but all the faeries trapped by Amarantha's vicious rule Under the Mountain. That he now turn out to be an overly controlling jerk who completely disregarded Fayre's severe PTSD was not a direction I was happy for the author to take things.

What I had not expected was how much of the bigger picture Fayre was unaware of when going through her harrowing tests for the psycho faerie queen. It quickly becomes clear in this book that the way Fayre (and therefore the reader) saw Rhysand was a very carefully constructed mask, and that his true self had to be buried deep, so the evil queen who made him her lover didn't suspect that he was in fact helping Fayre all he could. He continues to help her in this book, understanding only too well the trauma she's gone through as he suffered similar things for fifty years, while Tamlin was only Under the Mountain for a few months. While Tamlin believes Fayre to be a fragile creature who should be honoured, protected and sheltered from all that is harsh and unpleasant in this world, keeping her locked away in his mansion so nothing will ever be able to hurt her, Rhysand believes she needs to train to feel strong and confident in herself and gradually face her fears so she can become sure enough of herself to beat her trauma.

I would not have expected the book to take the turn that it did, but found that I didn't actually mind it too much when it happened, as the first third, where the reader becomes all to familiar with Fayre's PTSD and anxiety is very hard to get through. Fayre keeps silently shouting for help, to proud to actually admit to Tamlin or anyone else at the Spring court that she's slowly falling apart. They all seem content to just ignore anything unpleasant, hoping it will go away by itself given enough time. So when Rhysand finally comes to spirit her away, after Fayre's been screaming in her mind for anyone to help her, it feels like such a relief. He clearly has no nefarious designs on her, just wants what's best for her.

While the first book introduced us to the Spring Court and the horrors of Under the Mountain, this book also shows us the Night Court, in all its fascinating variety, and later the Summer Court. Fayre realises that there is so much she didn't know about, living with Tamlin at the Spring Court. As well as conquering her fears and moving past her trauma, she needs to come to grips with the huge changes her body has gone through. Her body isn't just faster and stronger than it was when she was human, she appears to have strange gifts that no other faerie has, clearly a side effect of the ceremony that brought her back from death's door. Now she needs to learn to harness and control these powers, in order to help the fae and humans battle their next big foe, the Fae King himself. Amarantha was just one of his generals, her deviousness and evil is nothing compared to the King's.

I liked A Court of Thorns and Roses well enough, and found it an intriguing retelling of several fairy tales. I had very few expectations going into this book, and certainly didn't expect to love it as much as I did. This was such a page-turner and I was completely engrossed in the story from very early on. The characters, the world-building, the emerging romance, it all works for me. I debated whether giving it five stars was the right thing to do, but even weeks after finishing it, I'm thinking about it and I don't regret my choice. I only wish Sarah J. Maas' Throne of Glass books could be as well-written and engaging.

Judging a book by its cover: I actually really like the stylised drawings on these covers, with Fayre in a prominent position, her outfit giving some hints as to the contents of the story. Her left hand, covered in the intricate tattoo showing her debt to Rhysand, the hints of a city in the background and Feyre herself in a dress looking more like chainmail than anything else. Our protagonist is changing, and growing stronger.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

#CBR8 Book 46: "A Court of Thorns and Roses" by Sarah J. Maas

Page count: 432 pages
Rating: 4 stars

After Feyre's father lost all his money, her family (widowed, crippled father and two older sisters) live in a tiny cottage desperately trying to make ends meet. They mainly survive because Feyre taught herself to hunt and tries to make sure they have enough to eat. The only way they make money is if her father sells one of his wood carvings or Feyre has animal skins to sell at the market. One day, when Fayre sees a giant wolf in the woods while hunting and kills it with an arrow through the eye. The pelt brings her a fair amount at market, but come the evening, she discovers that she made a huge mistake.

The wolf was in fact a faerie in disguise, from the near-by faerie kingdom of Prythian. A gigantic fearsome beast comes tearing into her family's cottage and demands that she come with him, to spend the rest of her life in Prythian, or pay with her life for killing the wolf. Fayre doesn't really have a choice and fears for the safety of her father and sisters if she doesn't go with the beast. She discovers that the creature is in fact one of the high fae, Tamlin, High Lord of the Spring Court and the wolf she killed was one of his vassals. Due to a curse, all the members of Tamlin's court are stuck forever wearing elaborate masks. There is clearly something badly wrong in Prythian, a danger that may easily spill over the borders to the human lands, but no one seems willing to tell Fayre the truth about anything, while she's otherwise treated as an honoured guest in Tamlin's household.

Initially, Fayre keeps trying to escape to get back to her family, until Tamlin reveals that he's made sure her father and sister are safe and in fact prosperous again, but only as long as she stays put on his lands. Reluctantly, she tries to settle into her new life and slowly, but surely, she grows closer to both Tamlin and his sarcastic, one-eyed envoy, Lucien. It also becomes clear that neither of them want any of the faeries from the other High Courts or the mysterious "she" who cursed them to realise that Fayre is living there.

Fayre's hatred and resentment towards faeries eventually changes, and she grows more and more attracted to Tamlin, who in return seems to love her. When danger threatens, he sends her home to her family to protect her, but she refuses to stay, wanting instead to fight it with him. She returns to find him gone, with his servants finally able to tell her more about what the curse actually entailed. Fayre now has to fight her way into the evil Faerie Queen's realm and risk everything she has to break the curse and rescue Lucien and Tamlin.

While I've seen this book described in a lot of places as a retelling of Beauty and the Beast, which certainly applies a bit, the fairy tale it reminded me the most of was East of the Sun, West of the Moon, one of my favourite stories as a child. The youngest girl in a family is taken away by a large white bear in return for untold riches given to the family. By day a bear, he turns into a man by night, although the girl never gets to see what he looks like. When she's eventually tempted enough to light a candle to take a look, three drops of wax fall on his shirt and he wakes up. If the girl had stayed patient for a while longer, the prince's curse would have been broken. Instead he has to go marry a troll princess. The girl travels east of the sun and west of the moon to track him down and has to complete three tasks to rescue him.

If I'd been aware that this book was based on one of my favourite fairy tales (I've not seen this confirmed anywhere, but I refuse to believe the similarities in the overall plot are co-incidental), I probably would have read it a lot sooner. As it is, I waited until it fit into my Monthly Key Word Challenge for April and found it quite hard going in the beginning, because Fayre really isn't the most engaging of protagonists. She's angry, cranky and quite hateful and it took me a while to warm up to her. At the same time, I suppose the fact that she refused to meekly accept her captivity and kept trying to save herself is better than meekly submitting, like a lot of classic fairy tale heroines.

The book really got interesting to me by the time I figured out that the story was indeed a lot more East of the Sun, West of the Moon than Beauty and the Beast and Fayre has to face up to what her pride and stubbornness has wrought. The challenges posed to her by the Faerie Queen really are nearly insurmountable and Fayre is forced to make some really uncomfortable bargains to survive long enough to get a chance to rescue Tamlin and Lucien.

While I thought the evil Queen veered too close to insane, evil stereotype, there were a lot of other interesting characters in the supporting cast. The eldest of Fayre's sisters seems pretty horrible at first, but really grew on me as the book progressed. I hope she returns in one of the sequels and gets more to do. I also liked Lucien, and while Rhysand was made out to be a bit of a push-over and a sinister creep to begin with, there is clearly a lot of complicated reasons he acts the way he does, and the way the final half of this book played out, we're clearly going to find out a lot more about him in the sequel. I'm asking you up front, Ms. Maas, can we please avoid the inevitable love triangle? Pretty please, with sugar on top? Can't Rhysand have a different love interest? Thank you in advance.

I tend to like my faeries when they're dark, ruthless and sinister and there was certainly enough of this in A Court of Thorns and Roses. One of the benefits of waiting so long to pick it up is that the next book in the series is out any day. So now I have that to look forward to.

Judging a book by its cover: It's an eye-catching cover, to be sure.There's a striking contrast between the red and black dominating the cover, with the writing all in white. I'm assuming the woman on the cover is Fayre, our heroine, based mainly on her long brown hair and the tattooed arm. Her outfit, however, looks like a leotard seemingly made out of black scales and feathers, and bears no resemblance to anything she is described as wearing at any point in the story.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.