Throne of Glass

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas is a fantasy novel that starts off a bit slow, but ultimately delivers an engaging story.

While the beginning might drag a bit, if you can push through, you'll be rewarded with a rich world, a compelling heroine, and a intriguing plot. Celaena Sardothien, the main character, is a force to be reckoned with. Her assassin skills are matched only by her sharp wit and captivating personality. The emerging love triangle adds another layer of intrigue to the story, leaving you wanting to know who she'll choose.

Overall, Throne of Glass is a good read with a strong foundation for the series. If you're looking for a fast-paced fantasy from the get-go, this might not be it. But if you're willing to invest some time in the world-building and character development, you'll be happy you stuck with it.

Here's a breakdown of the pros and cons:

Pros:

* Compelling heroine with a mysterious past
* Intriguing love triangle
* Rich world-building (although it takes time to develop)

Cons:

* Slow start


I would recommend this book to fans of fantasy who enjoy character-driven stories and don't mind a slower burn at the beginning. With its well-developed characters and interesting plot, Throne of Glass lays the groundwork for an exciting series.

Final Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Wondering why it took me so long to finally pull the trigger on reading this book because it was SO good. 

I loved the competition element, the castle, the training montages, the mystery element. This book was giving everything I wanted and I'm hooked. 

Shaping up to have ACOTAR be the least favorite of Sarah J Maas series for me. 

This book has been on my TBR for eight years and I FINALLY took the plunge and read the dang thing. As with all SJM series, it starts off a little slow and confusing because of the world-building and character introductions. With Throne of Glass, it felt like I was being pushed into a story that I hadn't read the first chapter of. I found out that was because there was a prequel (multiple novellas, actually), but many sources online said to read The Assassin's Blade AFTER the third book, so that is what I'm going to do. I pushed on and eventually, everything made sense.
Celaena's journey to become the King's Champion felt kind of Hunger Games-esque, but more fantasy. I loved the tension and relationship between Celaena and Chaol (which I still can't pronounce correctly), but Dorian's interest in her made me happy too. I hope her friendship with Nehemia deepens, she is such an interesting character.
I was expecting more magic in this series, but I expect that will come in later books. I'm interested to see what the King will have Celaena do as his Champion, and how Dorian and Chaol will resist her.

I loved this book! Not as much as I loved Assassin's Blade, which could have been the start of this series. Celaena gets a lot of hate for being immature and annoying, but lets remember she is only 18. Sure, she has seen a lot of crap for being 18, but I still enjoyed this book immensely. I can't wait to find out what happens in the series. I hope that this author doesn't drag this series on and on though. I can think of too many series that I lost interest in because of that.

Celaena is arrogant and a little dumb, but significantly more enjoyable to read about than Feyre. I liked Nehemia a lot (and I thought she had much better chemistry with her than with both Chaol and Dorian combined). In fact, I'm not entirely convinced they weren't developing feelings for each other. Speaking of feelings, I don't really like love triangles, so Chaol and Dorian fluctuated between annoying and tolerable, but they did improve as the book went on.

Nearly everybody else was kinda meh. Nox seems cool. Cain was whatever. Perrington is a creep. Kaltain is a bitch, but she's being taken advantage of in all the worst ways (she didn't deserve her ending imo and I hope that at some point she gets her revenge on Perrington). The Queen is whatever. And so on and so forth.

I do like the King. He's a terrible person but a fascinating character. Definitely want to see what happens with him and why he is the way he is. 

All in all, if you, like me, hated ACOTAR but wanted to see what all the SJM hype is about, give this a shot. It is a little juvenile/YA, but has enough dark adult themes to keep me intrigued.

In the book she has to adopt a cover story of being a jewelry thief and that backstory fits her waaayyy better than being the best assassin in the world. Also also, are you telling me the ‘world's-best-assassin' doesn't know not to take candy from strangers? She just gets up one morning and sees a box full of candy and decides to eat half of it without thinking that it might be a part of the killing spree happening! Really??

The only good attributes this book had was the worldbuilding and character banter. Other than that, it felt like the bare bones of a story like the author was just making sure all of the plot points were checked off instead of thinking about a story to tell. By the way, the book was too long for my liking, major ‘this-could've-been-an-email' vibes from me around the 300 page mark.

Everyone I know has been singing its praises, but I just didn't like it. I'll continue the series to find out what people mean when they say it gets better. But overall, this book just did not do it for me.

Oh and it gets two stars instead of one because there's a book she picks up called ‘The Walking Dead' and that made me chuckle.

Thx for reading <3

Visit my blog for more reviews. Pages of Starlight

Oh, how embarrassing. I actually like this book. clears throat Okay, let's try that again. All the while wondering why it's so difficult to write a review of a book I like.

I didn't think I'd like this book. Heaven help me, I didn't think I'd like this book. I thought I'd buy it and if it was mildly entertaining and diverting, it would be time well spent. And I've got a bit of a thing for assassins, be they male or female - especially those assassins that are starting to thaw a little. There's just something about those type of characters that make me go all mushy. So, the main character being an assassin immediately caught my attention.

Celaena Sardothien did not disappoint at all. I mean, seriously, I first met this girl and she's prickly, she's arrogant and abrasive and so incredibly full of herself. Then I read another few pages and fell absolutely in love with this mouthy ‘former' assassin. Celaena is so different than all the other lead females I've read about in fantasy stories. This here is a girl that's tough - and she knows it. Will probably rub your face in it. She stands up for herself but if she's ever put into a position that she cannot (IE: if she did, she'd be executed) she stands there, seething. More than once, the thought of killing someone just to get them out of her hair crossed her mind.

I just don't think I can describe to you how much I love this girl. I don't often feel this strongly towards the main character if it's a female in stories (though I almost always like them more than the leading male) but Celaena is just so incredible and amazing and I now really need to quit gushing about her and talk about the other characters. Like, you know, the guys.

Right... The guys.

Dorian, Crown Prince... I really got a kick out of this guy. Him and Celaena had some great back and forth joking going on. He was a fun character for the most part, but I had a hard time with one aspect of his character. You see, Dorian was a bit of a flirt. I don't mind guys with that personality trait, in fact I usually quite like them - this time being no exception. However, for a character like this to work for me as a love interest, I need to feel that he views her differently than he does all the other girls - and I never really reached that point between him and Celaena. I do look forward to Dorian growing as a character in later books of the series, because there was this one personality trait he has that I am less than enamored with.

Chaol, the Captain of the Guard. I really loved watching him and Celaena forming a friendship and relating to each other throughout the story. I will admit, I was interested in him from quite early on in the story due to the way he reacted and behaved about certain things. I think he was supposed to be the more serious of the two guys, but I laughed as much at his conversations with Celaena as I did Dorian's. There was something about him that gave him this boyish charm. I will admit, there were several instances toward the end of this book that Chaol just really, really impressed me. I mean, the way he was acting, he was actually starting to give Celaena a bit of competition for my favorite character.

I do feel that special mention must be made of Nehemia, a young princess from another land. This girl was amazing. Though she doesn't play a particularly large and important role in the book, she absolutely does have her moments (like towards the end...). And she becomes a close friend to Celaena. One thing Ms. Maas seems to know how to do exceedingly well is make strong, likable females.

The plot was quite cool. Having it slowly develop instead of everything slamming into you all at once was great. I know this story was inspired by Cinderella and, if you know that story, you'll be able to see a few instances of this inspiration. However, this story went off in it's own direction right from the start (and as someone that really didn't want to read about ‘Prince Charming' or evil stepsisters at that time) I thought that was great.

While there were a few slow moments in the book - as in, not much fighting (yes, it is that type of book) - the down time was used wonderfully to develop the characters.

I honestly cannot wait to read of Crown of Midnight because if it's close to as good as this book is, this series will be up on my shelf as one of my two favorite fantasy series, ever.