READING: A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court Of Thorn and Roses #2) by Sarah J. Maas

Publication date: May 3 2016

Published by: Bloomsbury USA

Genre: YA, Fantasy, Fae, Magic, Kings, Romance, Suspense 

Rating: 

Feyre survived Amarantha's clutches to return to the Spring Court—but at a steep cost. Though she now has the powers of the High Fae, her heart remains human, and it can't forget the terrible deeds she performed to save Tamlin's people.

Nor has Feyre forgotten her bargain with Rhysand, High Lord of the feared Night Court. As Feyre navigates its dark web of politics, passion, and dazzling power, a greater evil looms—and she might be key to stopping it. But only if she can harness her harrowing gifts, heal her fractured soul, and decide how she wishes to shape her future—and the future of a world cleaved in two.

Wow 😳😳

Sarah J Maas, you played me good. So good in fact, that for a minute there I actually thought this book was awesome. Only after I finished it and wondered what the hell I just read, did I realise that ACOMAF is nothing but bell and whistles, just showy and flashy mediocrity, nothing more.
Just for the nerve and skill it takes to successfully accomplish that and make $$millions out of it, I’ve got to hand it to you, you are absolutely brilliant. 
Your book? Not so much.

I will divide this review into sections – makes it easier to just read the parts you want and skip the rest.

SPOILERS AHEAD-YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

Content/Plot/Story: ACOMAF is a dense book. It’s 626 pages chock full of action and exposition. Is it all necessary and useful? Absolutely not. Was I bored? Surprisingly, not at all. I thought ACOTAR was boring in parts, but not ACOMAF.
I’m gonna be real with you though: what I really cared about was to see what’s gonna happen with Feyre and Rhys and consequently Tamlin, and that is what kept me turning the pages. Maas came up with a simplistic story about the cauldron and how to nullify it, which should have been front and centre, but only worked as a filler between the romance. And even then, it was mostly used as a plot device to bring F+R closer together. This way, the romantic aspect never ever let up, it was always present in the book and those two were almost always together in every scene. That is what made the book so addicting in my opinion, the slow burn romance. And Maas was a master in skilfully dragging it out without making the reader feel bored or uninterested. By doing so, she created a feeling of time passing very slowly, so you think that the events of the book take place in a span of years, but in actuality it has only been a couple of months. That’s mostly so we can forget about Tamlin completely and 1. accept that Feyre will choose Rhys and 2. be shocked by the "Tamlin is working with the King: reveal. I wasn’t, I actually found it very consistent with how he had been portrayed so far.
The ending was pitiful. After almost 600 pages of planning and training and covert missions, as soon as Feyre reached the cauldron, she surrendered almost instantly to its magic. This born again-power of all 7 courts-High Fae, who has proven she had so much power in other occasions, she couldn’t resist the cauldron and the book even for a second more and gave in that easily? It was laughable, really. She had enough power to break all of the King’s wards in the end, but no power to nullify the freaking cauldron. She had ONE job!
Let’s not mention the most powerful Fae in existence not being able to move a finger to do anything while King was dipping Feyre’s sisters in the cauldron (??) Also, why is Jurian working with the King? He was buddy buddy with Amarantha so Jurian should…hate him? I mean, it’s ridiculous if you think about it. No thought put into writing a decent story that actually makes sense. I know I said that I mostly cared about the romance, but I am still very aware that I am reading a fantasy book series. I think if you are a writer of that calibre, you can write both an alluring romance AND an engaging story in one book. Very disappointing.

Feyre
I never liked Feyre, and ACOMAF solidified that. She is very insecure and an attention seeker. She cared for her family yes, but she always made sure they knew it was because of her that they survived. I don’t think she’s that honourable that she could not forsake the oath she gave to her mother, whom she didn’t hold in any high regard anyway. As soon as Tamlin told her her family was taken care of in ACOTAR, she stopped worrying about them, choosing instead to blindly trust the word of a Fey she spent her life hating, and go on living her life in the luxury of Spring Court. 
At the end of ACOTAR, Feyre kills two humans because of her love (or attraction, lust) for Tamlin AND NOTHING ELSE. She couldn’t bare seeing him with Amarantha and she had to get him back. I think that is mostly what drove her insane when they went back to the Spring Court and she couldn’t sleep or eat. That she killed two people in cold blood for a guy she kind of just met. When the infatuation passed and she realised what she had done, it is only natural for her to feel shitty. But that’s on her, no one else is to blame for that. Yes, Tamlin was being an ass and was overprotective and was acting all alpha male. But also, can you blame him? She threw enormous fits because she was couldn’t stand the sight of the colour red (!) and then she was asking to go hunting evil, dangerous creatures with him. Like he would ever agree to that after seeing the freak-out state she was always in and how she cowered in the face of everything. I am not justifying Tamlin’s actions, but whatever Feyre’s psychological trauma was after what happened under the mountain, we never stopped to consider that Tamlin’s might have been the same or even bigger. I admit I didn’t when I was reading the book, and that is once again great proof of how Maas can skilfully manipulate the reader. 
In regards to Feyre, I don’t know what else to say. I think the absolute failure of her end mission speaks volumes of her and the way she approaches things that don’t directly pertain to her.
She craved Rhys’s attention constantly in both ACOTAR and ACOMAF, and pretending not to be attracted to him because it would be considered “traitorous” to Tamlin, was absolutely ridiculous. She even commented on the fact that Tamlin didn’t do anything to save her under the mountain while Rhys risked it all (again, massive manipulation). I don’t see her objecting to Rhys not doing anything to save her in the end of ACOMAF when his friends were in danger…just saying. She is self-righteous and such a drama queen when things don’t go her way, and will not admit that she is wrong to save her life. At least she admitted that she only fell for Tamlin because he was the first person to show her kindness. I think that must have been the only real thing she ever said. Apart from that, I have nothing good to say about her. Not a fan.

Rhysand
Look, I like Rhys. I liked him when he pretended to be evil, even though everyone knew he wasn’t, and I liked him when he was finally out as a good person in ACOMAF. The more I read and got deeper into the book though, the more I got that niggling feeling inside that something’s just not right. Every time Feyre gave him a very good excuse to blow a fuse or be protective or act like a jerk or just have a normal reaction like we have seen happen with MCs everywhere, he always reacted the same: calmly, politely and very well mannered, practically giving Feyre whatever she wanted and being the picture perfect partner.
She wanted space? No problem. 
She wanted to tease him relentlessly and not be teased back? He took it all in stride.
She wanted to be included in all meetings and decisions? Yes, ma’am.
He basically did everything in his power to show how diametrically different to Tamlin he was (manipulation again) and how Feyre made the right decision. While I don’t mind YA and NA MCs being uncharacteristically nice for once, I do think there is a limit. There is such a thing as “too perfect”, and that was Rhysand. When he went to the Night Court and tried to play the bad guy, it was just not believable at all, almost like a kid playing dress up. In ACOTAR, there was a good balance between his light and dark side, but in ACOMAF that all went out the window and he lost all the bits of his personality that actually made him interesting. His long ass speech in the cabin at the end was supposed to show what a hero he was, and how noble he remained through everything and I’m sorry for being harsh, but I thought he came across as completely spineless. His sentences started like “I wanted to say or do that blah blah but I couldn’t, because I respected you and I only cared about your happiness”. Boo hoo who cares?? Show some B-bone bro, seriously! Have flaws and take responsibility for them, nobody likes perfect. Perfect is sooo boring. Flawed characters can still be good-natured and respectful, it’s called WRITING A MULTI DIMENSIONAL CHARACTER! I think Maas did a disservice to both Rhysand and Tamlin in ACOMAF. And even though as I said I like Rhys, I would like to see him disagree or get angry or have any kind of a reaction to Feyre when she is being too dramatic or unreasonable, that is not pure adoration (barf).
I don’t think that Maas needed to invent mating to show that Feyre and Rhys have something special. I could have done without it. And the number of times Feyre calls Rhys her “mate” in the book, it’s just over the top. Yes, we get it! You are relieved you chose "correctly" and Rhys was your destiny and not Tamlin. If that’s what makes you sleep at night…
Rhysand, I still have faith in you. Please go back to the mysterious and cunning night creature you were in ACOTAR 🙏

Tamlin
First off, I want to acknowledge the fact that it takes massive balls to suddenly change the love interest of a YA/NA series in book two, especially one you made the readers so invested in book one. I have never seen or heard of it happening before in books of the genre, and anything that is so original is immediately interesting to me.
That being said, the shade thrown at Tamlin in ACOMAF, was on another level. Poor thing, I almost felt sorry for him. Even though I didn’t like the way Tamlin handled some things (yes, he is flawed!), we can all agree that Feyre is a massive drama queen and over exaggerated about everything. And I don’t even like Tamlin, I am Rhys all the way, have been since ACOTAR. But, we have to face the facts here: would we think Tamlin was bad if Rhys wasn’t in the picture? Would we think that he did “nothing” Under the Mountain, if Rhys was not there to serve as Feyre’s puppy dog, showering her with attention? Would we think that Tamlin locking Feyre in for “her own good” was as bad as shown, if there was not a romantic interest alternative already established? The answer to all that is no, we wouldn’t. If Rhys was not there or he was not pure perfection, Tamlin and Feyre would have a tiff, they would struggle to overcome the tortures they endured UTM, but in the end their relationship would become stronger for it and they would fight against Hybern together to save Prythian. It’s only in comparison to Rhys that we see Tamlin as an asshole. And Maas didn’t let us forget it! The comparisons between the two were endless and of course, when you’re compared to perfection you always lose. Only thing missing was Feyre comparing dick size and performance, which I wouldn’t put past her to do. It was done is such a crass way that is just wasn't fair. We couldn't even hear his side of things. The only thing that struck true to me was when Feyre admitted that both her and Tamlin were so badly hurt by Amarantha, that they could never recover after they came back. I can accept and agree to that. Maybe if she thought to say that to Tamlin, they would have broken up amicably and in a more reasonable and respectful manner. But no. She had to be all dramatic about it 🙄
Naturally, when it was revealed that Tamlin made a pact with the King, it was done, there was no coming back from that. We now officially hate Tamlin and we can no longer make excuses for him, period. And to think he made this deal only so he can get Feyre back because he thought that she was in danger at the Night Court, knowing what he knows of it. Remember, he doesn't know anything about Velaris and um, the Night Court did kill his entire family. So, a little food for thought there. That doesn’t justify him consorting with the enemy, but hey. Feyre killed two innocent fae to get Tamlin back. Potato potatho 🤷

Sex
Good Lord, that was graphic! Since when do YA books contain such explicit sex scenes? I am not going to be all prudish and say this is not for teens, because let’s be real, teens have seen more mature content on the internet that I have seen in my entire life! Note though, that is by choice and mostly unbeknownst to parents. However, when you market your book as YA and it gets shelved in stores as such, you have a certain responsibility towards a huge number of readers who are underage. I think ACOMAF should be a better fit in the New Adult genre, but then again *whispers* NAs don’t sell as much. 

Other characters: I liked the Night Court team. Wasn’t over the moon, but I had no particular problem with them. I would have liked to get to know Azriel more, he seems interesting. Cassian is the typical brute sidekick I have seen many many times before in YAs, but still enjoyable. Also, I can sense an enemies-to-lovers story with Nesta, and I’m here for it 🙌
Am I the only one who still likes Lucien and wants him to be King of everyone and everything? 😂 I mean, the bond with Elain is ludicrous, but apart from that I really like him. Hope Maas doesn’t destroy his character as well in ACOWAR.
I would also like to point out the lack of diversity in this book. I don't know about Maas's other series and what's going on there, but I'd take an educated guess and say...the same?

In summation, ACOMAF was, without a doubt, a very addictive page turner with an undeniably appealing romance. BUT! If you really stop and consider what you’re reading for a second, you will see this book for what it truly is: the most beautiful Christmas present you can’t wait to unwrap, only to find out it’s totally empty inside.
Or as Emer very well put in her review ← read it, it's dope.