Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - House of Flame and Shadow

Wow... a lot of questions for SJM and her editor. Unlike most her other books, this one started off as rollercoaster of confusion and insanity, and ended weirdly dull. The crossover was rather disappointing, and many of the characters seem to have done a 180. Not sure where the series goes from here, but this was my least favorite book even though the series started off so well. The scene in the prison made me want to hurl. 3/5 simply because this was a tome and felt like a master class in fantasy battles.

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cryosphinx's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

I waited a long time to write the review. When I finished, my immediate thoughts were I didn't understand the hate but as I let it ruminate, I can get it now, even if I don't agree with all the points. I think a lot of people had their hopes built up way too high and I came in not expecting much. I did enjoy this but I really wanted to enjoy it more. The POVs were swippy swapping too much, with shifts happening IN chapters. The characters that carried this book weren't the ones you expected but thank god they were there and made me fall in love with them. There seemed to be a lot of convenient happenings and some plot points that were built up only to be finalized too quickly that it lost all it's muster. But like any SJM book, the last 150 pages was an exciting whirlwind that I thought had a good conclusion. Out of the three, I think this one was my least favorite. There's a lot of open ended plot lines and questions that there better be a forth one but if I had to sum it up, it seems like a lot and nothing happen at the same time.

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withallthelies's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

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jackiepreston's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

There are too many POV characters and disparate plotlines happening in this story. I could have used less of almost every plotline because so many of them like the characters were just repeating their thoughts with no forward movement. Overall a good conclusion to the story.

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booktalkwithrae's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Even though this is not necessarily a bad rating, this is a very disappointing rating for me. SJM is one of my favourite authors and I love the Crescent City series and how this book played out was going to determine if this was my new favourite series by her… Needless to say the fact that it took me 3 1/2 months to read this tells you how I feel about this book.

I don’t think this series finale isn’t necessarily bad. There were a lot of good moments in the story. The book started off so strong and for the first hundred to 200 pages I couldn’t put it down. There was so much exciting things going on with all the characters. I loved being back with some of my favourite characters, some of the plot points and action scenes were very intriguing and exciting, but in my opinion, I feel like for an 800 page book. There’s not a lot that happened. I was expecting more reveals more shocking moments more throwing the book across the room and I didn’t feel any of that.

A lot of people said that the writing style of this book the fact that the author chose to change POV‘s within a chapter and so often. And I will agree that it did throw me off a bit, and it could be part of the reason why I didn’t love this book as much as I wanted to .

Some of the plot points that carried off from the last books, felt very quickly resolved in this book. Especially some of the romance. Speaking of romance a lot of it was boring. SJM really struggle to make conflict between the romance story lines (especially the ones that ended off so well in the last book) with many of the couples in the story. I definitely wanted to experience more heartache more heartbreak more struggles between the couples.

I know this is a very vague for someone who hasn’t read yet a lot of this doesn’t make sense. But I don’t want to give any spoilers to the book. Overall, I think this book was too long, I feel like there were a lot of boring parts that made it easy to put the book down and although the ending and how the whole series resolved was entertaining and enjoyable everything leading up to it was boring.

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barbarianmissy's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

Finally finished this series!

WOWEEE! Ok, this series was rockin’.

The ending was stellar, it was tied with a pretty little bow and left us a few snippets of what’s possibly to come and I’m QUITE HOPEFUL even though it’ll probably be a long while until we get the next book!

As for my final thoughts on the characters:

Fire sprites are just my favs, idk why but in the last 100 pages just the mere mention of them made me cry twice.

I love the endings we got for our main characters, Bryce and Hunts ending, so great, HORSES?!?! Iconic. Ruhn’s ending, I’m so happy for him, he’s such a sweet lil guy!! I hope these characters can find peace in the new world. They’ve dealt with enough. DOWN WITH THE MONARCHY!

BUT AS FOR THE FUTURE BOOKS I’m kind of hoping the next ones are centered around the side characters because their set ups for their storylines are super intriguing! Like Ithan and his new role and POSSIBLE ROMANCE???? And Tharion, Mr. unrelenting-need-to-defy-very-powerful-women-who-could-destroy-him-very-easily, dealing with marriage??? Won’t that be a treat! Also what’s gonna happen with Baxian, Isaiah, or Hypaxia and their new roles in the new world? Exciting stuff, man!

Anywho, I loved this series and these characters. They were absolutely delightful, I’m gonna miss them till the next book, same as ACOTAR.

NOW….. *drumroll*

I can’t believe it, folks, but I’m finally ready to start my THRONE OF GLASS journey! 🫡 WISH ME LUCK!

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shscochrane's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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purplexwidow's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.0

No context favorite moments & thoughts:
-Ruhn MF Danaan.
-Azriel is a club rat, and maybe a metalhead.
-Nobody in the NC knows wtf an iphone is.
-Lidia Servos absolutely serving.
-Ember Quinlan being the mommy we didn’t know we needed.
-I bet Jesiba Roga makes a mean drink … and she owes me one at this point.

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