Reviews

So I recently re-read this book because of the release of the third in the series. This one is still my favorite of the series. While the first book was good and introduced us to the world of Pythian, this book made everything more real. The stakes are higher with the threat of Hybern and Feyre having been made into a fae in the last book. What makes this book so good is that we get to know Rhysand so much better than we did in the first book.

This book starts out a few months after Under The Mountain and Feyre, understandably, has been having nightmares and trouble dealing with what she had to do to save Tamlin, who has also changed and not for the better. Tamlin has become more controlling and protective of Feyre and she feels smothered by it. But because she "loves" Tamlin she feels she must accept her new role no matter how much it chafes. She hasn't heard from or seen Rhysand since their last encounter after the events of Under The Mountain, but she still worries about the deal she struck with him to save her life. Everything comes to a head at the wedding of Tamlin and Feyre. Where in the first book such an event might have been looked upon more favorably by the reader, this time you feel desperate for Feyre to escape it as she starts to panic and realizes she cannot marry him. She begs for someone, anyone to save her and Rhys appears to do so still in the villainous disguise we became accustomed to in the last book. Rhys takes Feyre to the Night Court and Feyre starts to realize how poisonous Tamlin's love for her is, all the while finding herself and the strength within herself to carry on thanks to her new friendships with Rhys and his companions.

I won't give away anymore because this book is such a fun read! I absolutly love Rhys and this book does a good job of explaining how complex his character is and his motivations that we only got a glimpse of in the first book. I adore the allusions to different fairy tales and myths, especially the Persephone and Hades one going on in the book. I adore this series and I' eager to see what Sarah J. Maas does in the books after A Court of Wings and Ruin since she said she was going to focus on other characters besides the ones in the first three novels.

staring_at_words's review against another edition

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5.0

I was debating for a while should I write separate reviews or not but I decided to write one for ACOTAR and ACOMAF because in a way they felt as a single book. For me ACOTAR was a setup, an introduction, to everything that happens later. One cannot just read ACOTAR and be done and satisfied with the outcome, and while it does not, in my opinion, have a strait forward cliffhanger it leaves characters in an interesting emotional situation.
For everyone who is still debating should they read these books or not, I strongly suggest YES!

ACOTAR starts a bit slowly and has a classic romance novel feeling, but don't, under any circumstances, get discouraged by that, after a while pace increases and later, especially in ACOMAF everything makes sense and you'll see why everything is exactly as it should have been at the beginning. For me ACOTAR was great, 4 stars I would say, but ACOMAF, OMG! That one was AMAZING. The most incredible part is that it is 700 pages long and you can barely retell the plot, it is heavily character based and you'll enjoy every single line in the book.

At first ACOTAR felt a bit underwhelmed, I did not realize the hype, and because of the hype I was sceptic to start with. Story was interesting, settings also, Feyra I liked a lot but Tamlin was mah ... Lucian was, and still is, much more interesting than Tamlin. Before Rhys, I hoped Feyra would end up with Lucian, and I'm so glad he gets more screen time later on. The "Under the mountain" sequence is really interesting, I loved the trials, each one is exciting and different, every one ties nicely with some aspect of Feyra’s life, choices feel real and have real consequences as is seen in ACOMAF. I loved the suspense in Middengard Wyrm challenge, the panic Feyra felt with levers and heart breaking outcome of the third one. Her trauma was real and it is interesting to see how she deals with it later on and how she changes because of it. As Feyra herself said in multiple occasions “The girl you knew died under the mountain, and that gives a fresh perspective in ACOMAF. If her relationship with Tamlin felt forced and fake same as the entire Spring court that's because it should felt that way. I think the real value is in the contrast between Spring court and Night/Dream court. Her relationship with Rheys get so much more value when observed through the lens of her previous relationship with Tamlin, but also with his subjects. While Spring court feels restrained and cold in a way, Night court feels homey and inviting, feels true, and it's people living and breathing. There Feyra learns what home, and friends and family truly means, but she also learns who she is or rather how to be who she is with others, because she was always strong, resourceful, determined, a survivor, but people, Tamlin, wanted to subdue her, while Rhys encouraged her to grow, to embrace herself and her powers. Watching her master her magic was a delight, the scene where she finally grew wings was so empowering, I mean #goals. Ok, now a few words about Rhysand- he is perfect and their relationship cannot be described in a sentence or two. He is amazingly portrayed, I love how we get to know about his history to see what he is going through. Both him and Fyra having PTSD from what happened to them makes everything more real, and the way they help each other is beautiful. Their bantering and flirtations is hilarious, I enjoyed every moment of it.

There is so much more I could talk about, I don't have a single complaint about ACOMAF (and Tamlin is treacherous, selfish, bastard who should perish - I haven’t yet finished ACOWAR so I don't know if he redeems himself but either way)

At the end I want to say that these books made me laugh, and smile, and grin and swoon and have inspired me in the way a book hasn't in a long time and I'm grateful for it.

khoovreads's review against another edition

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4.0

Sooo much better than the first. Honestly took me ages to get invested in this series but the ending was so good

kyla115890's review against another edition

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challenging emotional mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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