Happy Tuesday everyone! I said I’d attempt to review A Court of Silver Flames, and thus here is my attempt. I find reviewing popular books super hard, and I really don’t do it often.
This book I found particularly hard to review, because I feel like I can rate it in different ways. I was utterly gripped by it from the start, and emotional-reader me says “give it five stars!” But, critical-reader me also saw some things that should make it less than five stars. The thing is, I’m not particularly fond of reading critically. I don’t want to weed through a book and find things that could be wrong with it. In my February wrap up post; I said that I really do read for fun. And I was having fun reading this book! So I’m going to tell you what I liked, and what I didn’t like, and still probably give it five stars because my feelings are honestly stronger than my brain.A Court of silver Flames
Small warning, since this is the fourth book in a series, there might be spoilers for the previous books.
This book definitely comes with a list of content warnings, so feel free to click below to view them!
A Court of Silver Flames
By Sarah J. Maas
My Rating: ★★★★★Published 16 February by Bloomsbury Publishing
fantasy | romance | adult
Nesta Archeron has always been prickly-proud, swift to anger, and slow to forgive. And ever since being forced into the Cauldron and becoming High Fae against her will, she’s struggled to find a place for herself within the strange, deadly world she inhabits. Worse, she can’t seem to move past the horrors of the war with Hybern and all she lost in it.
The one person who ignites her temper more than any other is Cassian, the battle-scarred warrior whose position in Rhysand and Feyre’s Night Court keeps him constantly in Nesta’s orbit. But her temper isn’t the only thing Cassian ignites. The fire between them is undeniable, and only burns hotter as they are forced into close quarters with each other.
Meanwhile, the treacherous human queens who returned to the Continent during the last war have forged a dangerous new alliance, threatening the fragile peace that has settled over the realms. And the key to halting them might very well rely on Cassian and Nesta facing their haunting pasts.
Against the sweeping backdrop of a world seared by war and plagued with uncertainty, Nesta and Cassian battle monsters from within and without as they search for acceptance-and healing-in each other’s arms.
What I Liked
Starting with a physical thing: I like that this book is big, but I like it even more when big books remain interesting. If I didn’t have to actually do other things, I would’ve attempted to read this book in one sitting.
Now characters. To be honest, I never really disliked Nesta much. My feelings in the previous books were more like “okay she doesn’t seem nice” and then I moved on. Of course I loved Cassian from the first time we met him. For some reason the comedic character in books always ends up being my favorite. I wasn’t sure about them as a couple, but I ended up really liking their dynamic. More importantly though, is that I loved all the new characters that were introduced. I don’t want to give too much away, but I will say that I enjoyed seeing Nesta make friends. It make sense that these characters were drawn to each other, and I feel like for Nesta they were a sort of clean slate.
But perhaps most importantly I enjoyed that this book showed that sometimes good people can be assholes, too. In the previous books, the High Fae were mostly presented as being near-perfect beings, but Nesta has always been able to see straight through that. I liked that since this book was from her perspective, we got to see how she views the Night Court and other Fae.
I really don’t want to say too much about Nesta’s mental journey, because I have absolutely zero experience with mental illnesses, and thus can’t really say how accurate or well written her journey was. However, I will say that I enjoyed reading it, and loved watching her grow as a character. But I think my most favorite thing about her journey is that Maas didn’t turn her into a prissy nice girl.
What I Liked Less
Okay so, I think that this book is supposed to focus more on characters than plot, but there was still plot. Or at least an attempt. I wouldn’t quite say that I didn’t enjoy the plot at all. It looks like it would span over the next books as well, but to me it just wasn’t as interesting as reading about the characters themselves. The thing is, whenever I was reading about the characters, I forgot the underlying plot existed, so I think it could’ve been fleshed out more. Ot at least should’ve been spread across the chapters more evenly.
I also didn’t particularly like the ending. I mean, I liked one part of the ending, but the other part was too anticlimactic for my tastes. My expectations for the final scenes were just completely different from what really happened, so I hope in the next books it’ll be better worked out.
And that’s about it! I’m sure that once I hit “post” I’ll think of a dozen more things to say about this book, but I’m not going to overthink it. In all, I really enjoyed reading this book, but I hope the next books will have a better fleshed out plot.
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That was a great review so pat yourself on the back! I didn’t read the book yet but with SJM I do have a tendency to get attached to the characters more than the plot itself. She has this talent of making the reader root the character and emotionally get invested in them. So I totally see what you mean by the plot!
Author
Thanks so much!! And well said. I think SJM is really good at fleshing out her characters to the point that they almost seem real. Plus I really enjoy character driven books when I love said characters. I actually prefer good characters over plot ?