Throne of Glass

Three stars for this book specifically, but 4-5 on average for the series as a whole.

This is a fine book one, but it's doing a lot of heavy lifting to set up the rest of the series. SJM's big three all have wildly different tones, so I would advise not going into this with the expectation that it's going to be “ACOTAR with different characters”. This is more fantasy forward. It's a strong series but I don't think it really hits its stride until you start getting into book three.

Unpopular opinion: I think it's fine to skip this series if you aren't enjoying it. It's a lot of books, and while I love them and think it's worth it, they're just not going to be for everyone. The consequences of not reading it are minimal in the grand scheme of things.

I'm reviewing this off a reread, so I tried to rate it objectively even though I know where the potential pays off.