Spoilery Book Reviews

House of Flame and Shadow by Sarah J Maas

Back of the book

Bryce Quinlan is stranded in a strange new world. She's going to need all her wits about her to get home again and return to everything she loves. But that's no easy feat when she has no idea who to trust.

Meanwhile, Hunt Athalar is back in the Asteri's dungeons. Stripped of his freedom and the happiness he'd fought so hard for, he's without a clue as to Bryce's fate. Hunt is desperate to help his mate, but until he can escape the Asteri's chains, his hands are quite literally tied.

My thoughts

I was very disappointed by the crossover. I feel often in SJM's writing she writes exactly what the fans want, is generous with their expectations. So I was disappointed that the crossover did not pan out how I wanted, despite it fitting in well with the context of the story. I hoped for Rhysand and Feyre to be featured heavily, and to show Bryce some of the Night Court and Velaris. Instead, Bryce never moved past being locked in a dungeon, escaped to some unexplored tunnels and was babysat by Azriel and Nesta. (Not even Cassian!). I expected less tension and hatred between them. With some distance from reading the novels I understand why it had to go that way, their personalities were always going to clash, but if you're going to pander to fans by including Rhysand and his world, I expected the pandering to continue to meet all my fanfiction crossover expectations.

I loved the concepts this book covered, about faeries travelling across universes and Hell being helpful, but it was a giant infodump. The memory ghost video in the prison was done poorly. The ideas were captivating but kept being interrupted by Bryce's commentary and checking in on other characters. Those techniques did little to make it feel less like an infodump, instead stretching it out even longer, more tedious. This series had some really big, awesome ideas at the centre of it but they weren't all explored smoothly.

I mentioned this in the previous review but there was such a huge cast of characters. It was too many for Maas to handle well, have all their stories be meaningful or tied to each other in some way. Perhaps this is just a me thing, but flipping between all the characters did not feel purposeful just annoying and jarring. Probably another reason why I feel resentful towards how many characters we were trying to follow. Ithan and Tharions' plotlines ... it's like some characters grew while others made poor decisions so there's still an avenue for SJM to write about in the future?

I feel SJM was a bit careless about her approach of abolishing the monarchy as if that will solve everything... In any other book it could be taken as a commentary on real-world politics, but I didn't take it seriously at all. In this context it just felt like a 'get-out-of-jail-free' card for Bryce so she doesn't have to manage all the faeries.

A few more unrelated comments:

· Using too many names always.

· Any relationship obstacles for Hunt and Bryce are never real obstacles. They just fuck and its all okay.

· Not everyone got matchy matchy and paired off at the end which is an improvement.

· I would have been okay with Bryce dying, and was disappointed that absolutely no important characters died. I guess I like a more high-stakes ending that isn't afraid to hurt you.

· I love fantasy but not war, except most fantasy books turn into warfare so this novel has that going against it from my opinion

Overall for the series, I enjoyed it, although I'm not sure where I'd rank it compared to her other series. I think my familiarity with her other series has me biased towards them. SJM has a particular style of writing and storytelling that won't float everyone's boat. But for fans of her other series I definitely recommend.

TL:DR

Awesome concepts, less than great execution of them. A fandom crossover that wasn't everything I wanted it to be, but I grudgingly respect it. No painful deaths, so read on without fear.