A Court Of Mist And Fury (A Court Of Thorns And Roses book 2) by Sarah J Maas (book review).

‘A Court Of Mist And Fury’ is book two in the ‘A Court Of Thorns And Roses’ trilogy by Sarah J Maas which is based loosely on the fairy tale ‘Beauty And The Beast’. Apparently, the first book, ‘A Court Of Thorns And Roses’, has now been optioned so look out for a film in the future.

As this is book two in a series, I’ll try not to give too much away but there will be some spoilers so please look away now if you’ve not read book one in the series. So, now that Feyre has come through the horror that was Amarantha’s Court and has become a High Fae, she now has to learn not only how to control her new powers but also who to trust in this new world of hers. Feyre is still haunted by the horrific things she was forced to do in order to save the people of Prythian but now she has to try and save them again along with the world of the humans. She needs to learn how to use her new gifts in order to make sure that a worse evil than Amarantha can be defeated in order to save the world as she knows it.

This book starts about three months after the end of book one, so Feyre has moved to live with Tamlin and is trying to figure out her new Fae body, along with arranging her marriage to Tamlin. Feyre is also trying to figure out what she wants from her new immortal life, things like getting married and being secure might not be quite as exciting when settling down means forever with someone, literally! We as readers are almost immediately introduced to a host of new characters and creatures which I found a little confusing at first. This introduction of new characters does not stop during the book as we get to know High Priestesses, Illyrians (non-Fae with wings) and something I’m not altogether sure about in the form of Amren, who I can’t wait to read more about. I really enjoyed the more evil characters in the book such as the Bone Carver, super creepy! This is one thing I love about Maas’ writing is her ability to write characters with so much back story that they are all so individual and you remember them once the book has finished.

I have to say that I really liked Rhysand in the previous book, not a popular opinion I know, but there we are. So I loved a lot of this book, including his highly dramatic ways and a certain entrance which reminded me of many an evil witch swirling in on a puff of black smoke! I was so pleased that Feyre had made her bargain at the end of book one, so I knew we would be seeing a lot of Rhysand in this book. I really enjoyed reading about how different but also completely beautiful his Night Court was compared to the Spring Court of Tamlin. All I can really say at this point in this review is that Rhysand will really surprise you. I found it a lovely element to the whole book but I know others amongst you will have a different view of things. Maas really does like to switch things up on her readers, so my only advice is really do not get comfy in any previous thoughts you may have about characters, just get ready for a bumpy ride! We get to see things that happened or were discussed in the first book from a very different angle in this second book giving the reader a very different perspective on things which made me feel very differently about a lot of the characters in the series.

I did enjoy this book overall but I did feel that a lot of it was very slow with some short but highly interesting sections. Given that this book is over 600 pages long, it does take a lot of commitment to get through it. Oh and it was a lot steamier than I was expecting, given the first book where pretty much nothing bedroom-wise happened. Maas does not hold back on these scenes so this is not a book for the younger reader in my opinion.

I’m glad this is only a trilogy; I don’t know that I would be able to keep reading these books at this length if this was a six book series. I can’t wait for the last book, now to see what Maas does with the story arches she has set up. I wonder how we will all feel about the different characters in the series; will Maas flip it all on us once again?

Sarah Bruch

June 2016

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(pub: Bloomsbury Children’s. 624 page paperback. Price: £ 7.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-40885-788-5)

check out website: www.bloomsbury.com/uk/childrens