[New post] A Court of Frost and Starlight | Thoughts and Review
Liz posted: " Announcement: You might notice some changes to what once was A Liz Lifestyle. My new blog name is What's Liz Reading? and the url has changed to whatslizreading.com. I'm in the process of updating everything, as well, so if you see anything in reference "
Announcement: You might notice some changes to what once was A Liz Lifestyle. My new blog name is What's Liz Reading? and the url has changed to whatslizreading.com. I'm in the process of updating everything, as well, so if you see anything in reference to A Liz Lifestyle, it will be updated soon to reflect the change. Ultimately, I made the change because I noticed I was reviewing mostly books and nothing else, so I decided to skip the rest and focus on books. Maybe even start a book club? If you're interested, please let me know in the comments!
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If you're a regular here, you know I've breezed through the first three books in Sarah J. Maas's "A Court of Thorns and Roses" series, so naturally I had to breeze through the first novella (especially since it's 400 pages shorter than the longest book in the series so far). Here are my thoughts:
Summary:
"Feyre, Rhys, and their close-knit circle of friends are still busy rebuilding the Night Court and the vastly-changed world beyond. But Winter Solstice is finally near, and with it, a hard-earned reprieve.
"Yet even the festive atmosphere can't keep the shadows of the past from looming. As Feyre navigates her first Winter Solstice as High Lady, she finds that those dearest to her have more wounds than she anticipated--scars that will have far-reaching impact on the future of their Court." (Source: Goodreads)
"Sarah J. Maas is the #1 New York Times and internationally bestselling author of the Crescent City, A Court of Thorns and Roses, and the Throne of Glass series. Her books have sold more than twelve million copies and are published in thirty-seven languages. A New York native, Sarah lives in Philadelphia with her husband, son, and dog. To find out more, visit sarahjmaas.com or follow @therealsjmaas on Instagram." (Source: Goodreads)
What I Liked About the Book:
First and foremost, I liked the length of this novella. I mentioned in my review of A Court of Wings and Ruin that the book was just unnecessarily long, so it was nice to continue the series with a shorter continuation. Also, knowing that the next book, A Court of Silver Flames, is around the same number of pages as A Court of Wings and Ruin, this novella gives you a nice break before cracking the spine on the next book.
As well, I liked how the novella dedicated each chapter to a different character's perspective of life after the war. It was interesting to see how they were all affected, yet they were all affected so differently. Like most readers, I stan Feyre and Rhysand, so it was interesting not having the novella center around them completely as the three books prior had... But, again, it was nice to get to know some of the other characters a little more deeply.
What I Disliked About the Book:
Although I liked that each chapter was dedicated to a certain character, this style of writing automatically makes me want to analyze and critique the author's writing style (thank you college-level literary criticism class!). When it comes to books written from multiple perspectives, I immediately check to see if the author wrote each character similarly or differently. For example, if the book is written in first person (which a majority of A Court of Frost and Starlight is), then I expect the writing styles to be different between them because that's more realistic. Feyre's and Rhysand's chapters were the chapters that were written in first person and, unfortunately, their chapters were written in similar styles as if the story was still narrated by Feyre (as the other three books before the novella were). If you're going to write from multiple perspectives, each character should have their own unique style of narrating and speech because that's more realistic, and Maas missed the mark on this small detail.
With that, some chapters were written from the perspective of Cassian, however, his chapters were written in third person. Why? Where's the consistency? Although Cassian's chapters were far and few between, it was distracting to have to switch from first to third person and it made reading Cassian's chapters hard. I've always said I preferred books written in third person, but when I started this series, I realized how good stories could be told through first person. Now, I almost prefer first person to third, so it made his chapters more difficult to read and felt like they were moving by slowly.
Rating:
Rating: 4 out of 5.
I loved reading this book and recommend it.
My ratings are dependent mostly on plot, character development, and likability, so even though I disliked a lot of the technical stuff behind the novella, I can't fault it for what I think is a writing style fault. Every author is entitled to their own particular style and although I may not agree with Maas's decisions, it's her novel at the end of the day.
Anyway, now that that's out of the way, I thought the story was a great segway between the last book and the next one (which I've already started). Is the book necessary to the series? No, not necessarily... It does give a lot of background to prepare you for the next book, but from someone that has already started the next one, Maas reviews everything in the fourth book so it's really up to you if you'd like to read the novella or skip it.
What I liked most about the novella was the focus on mental health and seeing how each character was affected by the war. It gave the reader a deeper understanding of each character and what they individually went through, and it made the characters even more realistic and genuine (which is hard since, ya know, they're fairies).
Overall, this novella was an interesting and easy read, but not necessary to the series. Check it out for more background, or skip it and continue with the novels... The choice is up to you!
Interested in reading A Court of Frost and Starlight for yourself? Click the cover below to purchase for Kindle or Audible, or in print:
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