Review: A Court of Frost and Starlight

A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I mean, it's pretty much official that I'm no longer a dues-paying member of the SJM fandom, but I still lowkey expect to pick up one of her books and like it.

This little diversion in the ACOTAR series, supposedly meant as a bridge between the original trilogy and the forthcoming new trilogy, was by far my least favorite SJM book yet. Not that it was a total piece of crap, but it almost felt like Maas pushed it out to ensure that between this, Catwoman: Soulstealer, and Kingdom of Ash, she'd still be able to meet the 1300-page quota to which she's made herself stick all the last couple of calendar years too.

It's a short little story, but it's too crammed with too many POVs, most of which are third-person, which feels really oddly out of place in this series - part of how it was easy to differentiate between this series and Throne of Glass being that this series has historically always used first-person. But here, only Feyre and Rhys get first-person - proof positive, yet again, that those characters are the big Salami faves even though there are other characters who deserve much more time in the first-person spotlight. Cassian and Azriel, for instance. And Nesta too, because she provides the most drama in this book by far. But no, everyone's third-person except for our "favorite" mates, who of course get a sex scene that takes up, like, ten percent of the book all by itself. Though I admit, I laughed out loud at the scene of Feyre telepathically talking to Rhys while he's in the sauna, and he comments how embarrassing it is for him to be "at attention" with his buddies all naked beside him. Haha, get over yourself, ya proud, fragile male hetero.

(Oops, I just called him a "male" even though SJM pretty much ruined that word forever. So sorry about that.)

I hope the other two SJM releases of 2018 will be more my speed and style - especially Kingdom of Ash since, theoretically, it should end that series for good. But until there's some proper continuation of the ACOTAR world - without Feyre and Rhys' POVs, gorrammit - I'll just sit here in my disappointment in ACOFAS.

Especially because, yeah, I admit, I still feel stung by the way Salami totally betrayed the Feylin fans starting with ACOMAF and Tamlin's complete personality 180. Especially since we get no less than two chapters of how broken Tamlin is after the original trilogy's events.

Aimal was right. Tamlin deserved better than to be completely demonized just to make Rhys look good by comparison.

But I could spend all day talking about how I'd rewrite SJM's books and get them right, so don't get me started.

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