Review by hedonistic_hunger - A Court of Thorns and Roses

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hedonistic_hunger 's review for:

A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas

2.25

mysterious slow-paced

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Things I liked: the fantastic World itself, it's not too complicated to understand, the concept of the courts is interesting and enticing; you won't get bombarded with tons of different characters and place names and whatnot at once; the character Lucien and his platonic bond with Tamlin

Things I didn’t like: I think my biggest criticism of this book is how dull, obstinate, fatuous and arbitrary the female Protagonist acts and thinks. Her reaction to things that happen to her or how she gets treated made me often times roll my eyes. This is very much linked to her two male love interest. Horrible characters. I don’t want to write an essay, so I’ll keep it short. One of them assaults her and then tries to gaslight her the following day by saying “I […] told you to stay in your room”. She also thanks him for not enslaving her although he kidnapped and assaulted her. It’s later revealed that he kept her at his court out of specific reasons, but these reasons do in no way excuse his behavior towards her. The other one sexually assaults her while pinning her down and basically makes her choose between her death or having to spend one week every month at his court. Which in my opinion also accounts as a form of kidnapping and blackmail. There’s a lot of talk about “owning someone” when it comes to the romantic relationships between the female lead and her two love interests, which I absolutely hated; The characters are not diverse at all, the male characters are basically the same handsome guy but with a different hair and eye color. I also really didn’t like how all the main female characters were described as thin and the only thicker woman, who was described as plump, appeared in a couple of sentences and has no further mention. The only character of color was killed within two pages. There are no queer characters either. The story is very much built on gender essentialism which I find very boring and irritating.

If you like Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard and/or Selection by Kiera Cass chances are high you might like this one as well. If you like The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare and/or Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo, chances are high you WONT like this one.

Content Warnings