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3.5/5
Non-Fiction
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WARNING: SPOILERS
Rating: 4/5
Pages: 848
Started: 2 February 2024
Finished: 3 February 2024
Summary:
Bryce Quinlan has stepped through a portal into another world, with no information other than a need to escape the Asteri--and learn how to defeat them. On the other side of the portal is an alternate world, still populated with Fae but ones who speak a different language and have a power greater and more unfettered than Bryce's. There, she meets Nesta and Azriel, who reluctantly help her explore a series of underground caverns that hold both great power and great knowledge. Yet Bryce never forgets that all she does is part of her fight to return to Midgard and defeat the Asteri, freeing herself and all those she loves.
Hunt, along with Ruhn and Baxian, has been in the Asteri dungeons for weeks. Though he's not unaccustomed to torture, it's only the thought that Bryce is away and thus safe that keeps him breathing through each moment of pain. Yet even imprisoned and powerless, Hunt is not without allies.
The power of the Asteri is great, but the more Bryce and her friends learn about them, and the more allies they gather, the more they understand that the Asteri can be beaten--must be beaten, so the citizens of Midgard can finally achieve true freedom.
Thoughts:
Sarah J. Maas is a very talented author. I was not in the best place while reading this book, so I perhaps did not enjoy it to its full potential, but despite that I was extremely invested. There is so much excitement and intensity and emotion in this book that it was very fun to read. It's hard to resist so much power and sacrifice and commitment to friends.
The easter eggs were also very exciting. Though the A Court of Thorns and Roses crossover was a bit weird, a bit more extensive than necessary for the plot especially since readers know Bryce isn't really in any danger with Nesta, it was still very exciting to read, and I think it was an excellent choice to not involve Feyre in this book. It would have divided loyalties, and since Feyre is a self-insert character while Bryce is not, their meeting might have felt odd. The Throne of Glass crossover was more exciting to me, with Lidia secretly being an heir to Brannon and having the same powers as Aelin. That made me very happy to read. The second part of the ACOTAR crossover was also really lovely, since it provided Nesta with an experience with a true mother, and I'll be very curious to see her thoughts on that in the next ACOTAR book.
This book did have several flaws. The emotional stakes were never particularly high--Bryce was obviously going to end up with Hunt, Ruhn with Lidia, etc; there wasn't much guessing or tension as to where relationships would end up. And there weren't any unexpected (and thus tragic) deaths to throw readers off either, nor were there many big reveals or surprises or the adept uses of dramatic irony that are so well employed in TOG. Bryce did have some badass moments and good reveals, but there could have been more, especially in the middle and the end of the book.
That doesn't change the fact that this was an excellent book that had me wildly emotionally invested at the end. When Hunt used Sandriel's soul to propel him to Bryce in the portal I lost it. Even the less perfect SJM books are lovely to read, and I'm very glad I read this book.