A Court of Frost and Starlight

Unfortunately, I really struggled to get through this book. I thought Maas couldn't do any worse than the last book (which I thought was just OK.), but I felt like this book on its own was pretty unnecessary. The biggest thing is that there is no plot. It's just all the characters celebrating the solstice, deciding what they're going to get everyone as gifts, painting, and a little bit of Feyre in conflict with Nesta. Secondly, I'm just not a fan of the character perspectives changing every couple chapters, especially when some perspectives are in the first person and some are in the third person. Because of this, I had a hard time keeping track of what was going on. I will say it was nice at times to see what happened beyond Feyre's perspective, and I understand why Maas chose to write the book this way, but I think there were several chapters that could have been written from Feyre's perspective as more of a rehashing to limit the confusion of going back and forth. The last negative that I have - and this is something that I've had a problem with throughout the series - is that the magic system seems to have fewer and fewer rules. In the first book, it seemed like there were very specific abilities that very specific individuals were able to possess, but as time has gone on, the magic has become too convenient with people able to make things appear and disappear, move, and turn on and turn off with only a simple thought. I wish Maas would have gone into more detail at this point to explain the boundaries of the magic system so that I could better suspend my disbelief.

Now, some pros, because there had to be some if I didn't DNF the book. Maas, as always, did a wonderful job of writing extremely vivid scenes with multi-dimentional characters. Also, while there wasn't much of a plot, there was still some conflict between characters that allowed for further character development which I think will set things up nicely for the next book. Granted, I did feel like there was lots of dialogue that was forced and just didn't feel natural, but the characters' personalities and values remained consistent throughout. Lastly, one of the reasons I absolutely loved ACOMAF was Maas' ability to show trauma in her characters, and she certainly carries that through in this book as well. I loved the developments on Nesta, and I'm looking forward to reading more of her story in the next book.