Reviews with content warning for Misogyny - A Court of Silver Flames

This book covers so many issues that are relatable to female life. Dealing with grief, low self-worth and self-loathing, misogyny, overcoming adversity both real and perceived... the list goes on.

Though Nesta comes off as a despicable person in the previous books, you really get the chance to see first hand and to walk her journey alongside her.

Even though it is a long read. I felt every scene relevant to the plot and provided valuable insigh into the characters' innermost thoughts and rationale for their actions.

I also, I thought Rhys was an ideal book boyfriend, but Cassian and his dirty mouth had swooped in with that impressive wingspan and taken the top spot.

Plot: 4.5/5
Spice: 3.5/5
Book boyfriend: 6/5

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luminescify's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense slow-paced

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

4.0

I started this book last year in August and it took me an eon to get through. The pacing was really slow - as is expected of an SJM book - until the last 200 pages or so.

Nesta's character development is the primary focus of this book which was awesome, I don't hate her anymore, however I feel that a solid 90% of this book was filler, and the same mundane shit over and over and over again.

That being said, I enjoyed the sibling relationships and watching Nesta allow herself to heal and receive love despite believing that she deserves it.

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riannonsbookishera's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

“Cassian was good. In his soul, in his warrior's heart, Cassian was good in a way Nesta knew most people were not. In a way she knew she was not and would never be.”

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

As much as I love ACOMAF, Silver Flames beat it. I didn’t think it would, but I love it more and more each day I sit and think about it. Smut aside, I loved the telling of Nestas story and the female friendships that formed around it. I loved it ending with the three sisters together and happy. I also loved that no beloved characters died! 😅

Some complain that this story was too slow and they couldn’t get into it. But I loved the slow burn beginning and I think it was necessary to get the amazing last half of the book setup.

Rhysand could have cooled it a little bit with his unnecessary loathsome attitude toward Nesta and her struggles. Regardless of their own personal struggles, it got a little ridiculous to me. But that was my only issue.

Can’t wait for the other.. 2 books? I’ve heard. What!? Yesssss!!! So excited and will definitely reread this series. 🧡📚✨

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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? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Honestly I had a fun time. This was definitely the spiciest SJM book I have read THUS FAR, but I kind of missed Feyre and Rhys, not gonna lie. However, it was exciting dipping my toes into a new ACOTAR storyline. The third person writing took a while to get used to but I ended up adjusting to it and liking the shifting perspectives.

Although, I must admit that Nesta is a nasty wee thing and it took me a while to appreciate her character as she was QUITE A BRAT for the first part, but I like that she’s very imperfect and recognizes her flaws and is trying to do better. Cassian on the other hand is a golden retriever and everytime she’s mean to him I wanna stomp my foot in protest cause HE DOES NOT DESERVE IT! Although the line “stop being so mean to me or I’m gonna fall in love with you” is 100% him. BUT STILL! BE NICER, NES!

I really enjoyed the Valkyrie storyline and I’m excited to see more of Gwyn and Emerie moving forward. Reclaiming their power after the patriarchy was a real bitch to them is quite awesome and I love that they’re girlbossing so hard. This book made me want to exercise so I could potentially eventually kick someone’s ass (am I going to? Probably not. But I thought about it!)

🚨HOT TAKE ALERT 🚨

I know everyone likes the idea of Elain and Az BUT I think they’re both too quiet for it to be interesting. I honestly think I’d like to see the awkwardness that is her and Lucien’s mating bond unfurl AND I think I like the idea of Az with Gwyn better! Cause Gwyn is hella cool and they already have banter and mutual respect for each other. I DUNNO ITS JUST MY HOT TAKE!!!! 🤷‍♀️

Hoping SJM comes out with another ACOTAR book soon so I can hang out with all of my imaginary friends again, but until then - CRESCENT CITY YOU’RE UP NEXT!

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tallard's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

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

5.0

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smolone13's review

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring sad medium-paced

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

5.0

Ratings:

Goodreads: 4/5

Storygraph: 4/5

My Rating: 5/5

Synopsis:

Nesta has an intervention and ends up under Cassian’s care to get better.

My Review:

Since the first book I had drawn attention towards Nesta, as an older sister myself, and at first I did kind of dislike her. I honestly saw Nesta as someone who just didn’t actually care about anyone around her except for herself. But after A Court of Frost and Starlight, I quickly realized that she was going through PTSD. She was traumatized.

Nesta is the prime character of this entire book and it shows how destructive her current lifestyle is. The PTSD, the trauma, and most certainly depression. Nesta sleeps around with other fae males, drinks until she cannot remember the next day, and she isn’t eating. She lives in a disgusting apartment, doesn’t clean up after herself, and doesn’t allow any fireplace anywhere near her to be lit. She doesn’t even take baths. Quickly it is noticed that she is broken. Probably for a long time as well. As seen from the first book, it’s almost like she has given up and the only person that she wraps herself around is Elain. Nesta’s destructive behavior ends up leading her to have an intervention. Feyre and Rhysand, mostly these two, decide it would be best that she lives up at the House of Wind, train with Cassian and work in the library with the priestesses. Although Nesta is pissed off about these turn of events, she goes through with it.

Cassian, the sweet man that he is, does his absolute best trying to get Nesta to join practice. Nesta does well with no drinking, working with the priestesses in the library and does an okay job socializing, just not training. Just when Cassian feels like he won't get anywhere, he decides to change the setting by training at the House of Wind instead of training at the military camp. By a miracle, it works. Cassian helps her gain some confidence, helps give her the push to heal, and honestly it made me fall in love with him as a character. Cassian just keeps his hand held out until Nesta is ready to take it. Cassian also heavily protects her when some of the others are just being dicks. Besides Azriel of course who just minds his own business.

Rhysand was actually one of the characters I started to dislike. The excuse being that Feyre is pregnant. However, I find it ridiculous. Rhysand, as old as he is, including the others don't recognize that Nesta is hurting. Only one to truly notice that is Cassian. The others don't understand why she's destroying herself, including Rhysand who truly believes Nesta has some form of hatred in her to hurt Feyre. Amren as well made me upset, but I also understand that she is technically a new mortal. She has been a being of no feelings for a long time.

Feyre believes Cassian is able to help her and has noticed that she has been improving so she isn’t completely involved. Not to mention, she has been trying to have a successful, safe, and healthy pregnancy. Elain was honestly just useless in this book besides showcasing that she doesn’t want to interact with Nesta. Elain I am almost positive is not as innocent as she makes herself appear and that she is a more hate-filled character than we see. Elain almost strikes me as two-faced.

Now for my two favorite additions! Gwyn and Emerie. I love these two women and they gave Nesta a way to interact, become a stronger woman, and even gain a sense of leadership but also understand teamwork and passing the baton around. Gwyn is a priestess who came to the library after witnessing her twin get beheaded in front of her and then gets gang-raped. Emerie was brutally abused by her father, including the rest of the males in her family, and now runs her father’s shop as a way to distract herself. NEsta, Gwyn and Emerie become close friends and create their own group with other priestesses to become Valkyries, an old forgotten group of female fae warriors. The three of them together made me fall in love with this entire book. They bonded over their hardships, overcame their trauma, and in the end became strong females.

The book had multiple plots. The first plot is Nesta overcoming her trauma and becoming a stronger character. The second was her finally letting go of her fear, being able to openly communicate and finally end up allowing Cassian into her heart. The third was stopping the “young” evil queen from taking over.

I truly did love this book and I completely fell in love with Nesta. I would read this book over and over again. It was comforting, it had some depressing topics within the book, it had suspense, it had adventure, it had the spicy romance and I just could not get over this book. Out of this entire series, this was my favorite book.

Next is The Assassin’s Blade and after that is The Crescent City Series! I absolutely can’t wait to get through these books.

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zoec24's review

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challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.0

Too much smut. The plot was a mess-it's more 'oh, hey, here are these random legendary powerful items, find them in 100 pages max pls!'
Nesta should have not needed to use the romance to heal-I liked the sisters better. And the Blood Rite was thrown in. Also, TELL FEYRE ABOUT THE PREGNANCY!!!
And the IC were all horrible to Nesta except Azriel and Cassian. AMREN SHOULD NOT BE MORE COMPASSIONATE THAN MOR!!!

Content Warnings

reading_diaries's review against another edition

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adventurous reflective tense medium-paced

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

2.75

Nesta is so unlikable I want to punch her. She's so defiant and narcissistic that she can't even fathom the concept of empathy and kindness, WHICH EVERYONE ELSE FUCKING HAS GIVEN HER. Cassian is so god damn patient, praise him. Nesta's flaws and lack of accountability are the slow reason why I will forever be a Nesta hater, how do you continuously be a bad person, notice how it's affecting others and still pull the same shit? The fact that she was continuously painting Feyre as the villain when it was Feyre who was always protecting her sisters, feeding her sisters, sheltering them and Nesta still has the fucking audacity to have Feyre pay her rent and while she does absolutely nothing.

Cassian. My man, Cassian. I loved your perspective but homeboy run. The whole relationship was quite toxic and it's annoying how Cassian was ready to break all the rules for her. Risk death for a woman who's been nothing but a bitch to YOUR family that openly welcomed her? No chance my man.

The only good part about this book is

the rite. Nesta, Gwyn and Emerie do what no woman has done before...wow big shock. Realistically, they would have died, for sure. They get months (if that) of practice and then they just fucking survive and beat all the men? Yeah sure okay. While I do like the fact that they have decided to be valkyries and rebuild the female warrior group, I think there's so much sexism in this book that was so unneeded and the plot line would have worked better without it.

Can we talk about the pacing of this book? 20 hours...20 FUCKING HOURS AND THE MOST INTERESTING PART HAPPENED IN THE LAST 20(ISH)% OF THE BOOK?!?!?!?!?!? This book (like all Sarah J Maas) books was comedically too long.. You could have cut this into a 6 hour book and it would have been so much fucking better. There's so much of nothing happening, of repetition that doesn't amount to nothing, of Nesta's annoying fucking personality to warrant 20 hours. Waste of time, thank god I read it on 2.5 speed or else I would have died.

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