Well… I did it. I finally read the much talked about ACOTAR. Here’s my thoughts and spoiler free review!
I knew going into this book that it has an almost cult like following and people love this book and the rest of the series. The ‘hype’ around a book doesn’t usually effect how I feel when reading a book so I wasn’t worred about that… however, I had since of my own already formed opinions and thoughts about the book before reading it.
If you’ve been following me for a while you may know that I fell into a very unfortunate situation where I ended up with THREE copies of A Court of Mist and Fury (the 2nd book in this series) without ever hearing about the series before. It annoyed me in many ways and I began to lothe just looking at that thick blue book so I set one copy on my shelves and figured I’d never read it. Then when I started joining more bookish groups on Facebook & Instagram every time a book by SJM was released people would go nutters! The series and what I knew of it and how people reacted to it reminded me a lot of Twilight and it’s insanity. I was 15 when Twilight (the book) was released and I was definitely the target audience! I loved the books, hated the movies, and while now as an adult I see how many flaws it had it still is special to me. ACOTAR seemed exactly like that to me, this generation’s ‘Twilight’ type obsessive craze… was I right? Was my mind changed by reading the book? I won’t say anything more until the end of the review.
A Court of Thorns and Roses is about a human girl that by unfortunate circumstances ends up in the fairy realm. I admit that I haven’t read a lot of fairy/fae books, not since reading the Tithe series by Holly Black when I was in high school actually. It was a quite difficult getting through most of the names, and so I just pronounce them the way I want to – I can’t wrap my mind around most of the actual pronounciations – sorry, but the rest of the story seemed to flow well. However, I can’t compare it to any new-ish fairy books.
World building was good. The descriptions of the lands and the layout of the world and houses were very good. Getting to know all the different types of creatures in the world was also seemingly easy as their descriptions were done well. I particularly liked that the background of the world is layed out well, but not over done, in this book. The history of the two realms and the war and the misgivings that occurred during that time. I never had any problem putting myself right into the world with the characters.
World Building: 5
The character development was also good. Most of the characters had a lot of good back story that was laid out and they were easy to get to know. The main character I thought was pretty stagnant, I hate when a character is unable to adapt to her new world or new way of life, and she had this issue. It’s possible that she will grow into her new life in the next books, but this one she seemed really resistant to me. The guys were a little bit better in terms of character growth, but it was their world and were clearly hiding something that the main character wasn’t able to pick up on. I do however, hate the tropey “I had no idea [character] was this way though I’ve known them my whole life” thing, which this book threw in towards the end and it was pretty annoying to me.
Character Development: 3
The relationships to me in this book were ok. Friendships and relationships in general were lack luster and had me wondering why they even tried. The friendships that the main character developed seemed forced, like she literally forced herself to be around these prople until they tolerated her, but they still dodn’t really care about her in any real fashion until it came to the possibility of a tragedy, and then only so much. (This next part might be kind of a spoiler, you can skip if you want) As a teen, I loved the “human girl falls in love with an immortal” story, and if I was still that young I’d probably love this book for exactly that reason. However, that type of story line, especially with teenagers and immortals, isn’t really my type of thing any more and I find it creepy and disturbing. I had an idea from the beginning that this is what would happen, and I wasn’t wrong. There is also some sexual references in the book, that I wasn’t really expecting and it bordered in the realms of what you’d find in a romance novel when described though not super explicit. PG-13+
Relationships: 3
Emotions were pretty mediocre in this book. My core feeling while reading the book was annoyance in the main character, and shock that I kept seeing similarities to other popular stories like ‘The Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘Twilight’. I did tear up once because of a kind thing that was unexpectedly said, but there was no other real emotion for me in the book. This is unfortunate, becuase I felt there were several times when I thought “Ok, this one is going to hurt” but it didn’t. There’s a sizable amount of fights, death, and other disturbing moments in the book and I thought at least half of them would make me feel something, but they didn’t.
Emotions: 2
The pacing of the story was good. A few days would be skipped here and there but not big time skips and overall the story flowed really well. I felt that nothing was overlooked and the events that occurred took an appropriate amount of time. The ending of the book was more intense than the bulk and it wish it would have not been drawn out as long as it was, but that’s because I wanted to get through to the end to find out what happens.
Pace: 5
Now, there were some similarities to the Twilight story, but at the end I don’t think it was really like that story much in the final execution. It is more mature, especially in the first book and there’s no obsessive love going on or any love-triangle yet. However, after reading only the first book I would still call ACOTAR this generation’s Twilight because it has a similar (possibly more obsessive) following and a similar premise to what happened in the Twilight books. It’s not AS bad as Twilight, better writing and the girl at least has a simblance of self confidence. I’d tell a 14 year old to read Twilight over ACOTAR (it’s too dark and mature in my opinion), but I’d tell a 17 year old to read ACOTAR over Twilight. I think the book was too young for me, at 28, but I could see how it appeals to a slightly younger audience.
Overall, I give A Court of Thorns and Roses 3 out of 5 stars. It’s not my type of story but I think the world building was particularly strong. If I continue reading the story it’ll be to get another taste of the world and hopefully a broader view of the other kingdoms.
ttyl,
Squared
Squared's Book Reviews 