Review: A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J Maas

Excuse me while I crawl out from under the rock that I have been hiding under for the past few months. Classic me, I didn’t plan my time well enough and ended up getting swamped by my finals and summer courses. It’s been a wild time, but I’d say that it’s been time well spent. All my courses went well and now I finally have a bit of time to breathe and do leisure activities. My reading has picked up incredibly even just this past week. I had been struggling with finishing London, but after realizing that I wasn’t enjoying that (more on my first and potentially only DNF later) I picked up and moved on to something that I would find more… engaging.

The first book that I decided to help get me out of my reading rut was one that I thought would be a surefire one – A Court of Frost and Starlight. Not to say that it wasn’t, but this novella was one that I was surprised by. First of all, I kind of forgot that it was a novella. I was expecting more of a story, whereas I found that ACOFAS was more just fluff and a peek into the character’s lives. Which I’m not complaining about, but I gotta say – my interest in Rhys and Feyre’s love life is pretty minimal. I don’t want more sex scenes, I want more scenes with Nesta and Elain adjusting to being fey, with the circle dealing with the PTSD that the past 50+ years of war and imprisonment have caused, with Lucien dealing with losing his family again and trying to find a new place in the world. There were about a hundred different storylines that SJM could have followed and I would have been just as satisfied, if not more. I would like to see this explored more in the future.

I feel like it was really only the end of the novella that was used as set up for the next three novels. But man oh man, I’m so excited for whats coming. In my opinion, I would love to see SJM explore how the integration of the human and fey worlds is going, with the Queen’s being explored as potential new villains. The storyline of trying to reconcile centuries of feuding between the two races would be a great thing to expand on. I’d also be interested to see who else would be a potential villain – maybe Tamlin? Maybe the other people in the Autumn Court? Also what was it that Mor felt in the woods – perhaps a new evil for the circle to go up against? Overall, The set up I think is there for a really cool new trilogy, and I can’t wait to see where the story goes.

One aspect of the story that I really liked was how Feyre used art as a mean of healing. The development of this part of her life, with the introduction of her studio, and looking at the other fey in Velaris and how she helped them, was such a nice touch. It makes Feyre passion for painting feel more real. And partnering with another fey, someone who we had never seen before, was really nice. For me, its the little touches like these that make the world of Velaris so much more real and tangible. I can imagine walking down the road to Feyre’s workshop and finding myself spending hours painting or creating to channel my feelings.

I think one thing SJM could have done differently is included more characters – not even in different POVs but focusing a little less on Feyre and Rhys and more on Nesta, Elain, Lucien, etc. I love Feyre and Rhys, but I found myself skipping their scenes to get back to the others. One common issue I found people had with the book was how Nesta was treated. I do have some issues with it, but I also think that it’s a difficult topic to judge. On one hand, Feyre gave Nesta as much space as she wanted, supported her in ways that she would accept, and only pushed her at the end when it seemed like her actions were harming herself. But then again, they did force her out of her comfort zone by sending her with Cassian, an intervention which was not wanted, and also made her feel uncomfortable at their Solstice party. I mean, who doesn’t get her own sister a present just because of her difficult behaviour. I had a couple issues with things, but I don’t think that it’s possible to have a perfect response in this case. Dealing with PTSD and trauma is super difficult, and throw a difficult familial relationship on top of that there are bound to be issues.

All in all, I’m excited to see where our friends in Velaris go next. I’m definitely super invested in Elain’s and Nesta’s stories. I’ll definitely be reading the next SJM book as soon as it’s out! I think that this one gets a 3.5/5 for me.

Let me know what you think of the book, and if you have any suggestions for future reads!

That’s all for now ducks, happy July!
– Mon