(Before I start, can we please appreciate my efforts of photography, I mean.. well I'm proud of myself aha :'D)
I wanted to read this book as soon as I heard about it from a book-tube video on YouTube. Being undeniably obsessed and in love with fantasy this book went straight on my tbr and it being compared to Game of thrones (my fave) AND having a strong female protagonist who just happens to be an assassin sent this book to the very top of that pile.
This story takes place in Erilea, a fantasy land banished of magic and ruled by the ruthless king of Adarlan (oh more or less.. he rules a lot of it). It follows 18 year old Celaena Sardothien, the most notorious Assassin in the land, send to the salt mines of Endovier to pay for her crimes. After a year of torture the crown prince makes her an offer she can't refuse; to compete as his champion in a series of tests to become the king's personal assassin and as a reward one day earn her freedom. Along side her battling to take her 23 competitors down she finds herself lost in the mystery of what other evil is lurking in the castle that is taking the champions down.. one by one. DUN DUN DUH!
Crappy synopsis but I tried :)
Here is where you can buy it and read the actual synopsis if you like.
If you haven't read Throne of Glass I suggest you stop reading now because I'm about to go into detail about the plot and characters etc and would hate to spoil it for you. YE BE WARNED! So goodbye non-throne-of-glass readers-who-don't-want-to-get-spoiled AND ENJOY!
Okay so where do we start...
The Writing
I haven't read a book written in third person for a while so it was a nice change. Being written in third person meant there was a lot more detailed descriptions, world/character building and scene setting.. those sort of things. I think Sarah J Maas is a beautiful writer and really brings the world she's created a live and makes her readers fall in love with it and everyone mostly everyone in it. The only part of her writing I struggled with was the language, she uses some terms that before reading this I had no idea they even existed but I think that's just because I haven't read many young adult fantasy novels... or I'm stupid.. haha. This wasn't a huge problem because I just googeled the words I didn't know the meaning to and throughout the book she more or less uses the same "fantasy/medieval" terms so with in a few chapters or so I could go Google-less ;)
The World
Erilea is a medieval fantasy world filled with knights and nobles and has elements of magic. Despite being a magical made up world I think Erilea is a realistic sounding world, well as realistic as fiction can be. It's not a magical land of froufrou where everyone lives in harmony and skip through meadows together singing, here there are real world problems like slavery and rebellions due to being run by a pants king.. it reminds me and awful lot of Westeros ;) The first book did an excellent job of building a world for the rest of the series can pan out.
The Characters
I think the character were also very realistic and I couldn't help but get attached to most of them. Which is something I sometimes have trouble with in a book and a book is never really great when you don't really care about the characters.
Celaena Sardothien
Probably one of the coolest female protagonists ever! And undoubtedly badass when I comes to assassinations and fighting. Every time she whoops someone and full blown owns them I find myself with a huge smirk on my face. GIRL POWER! An example of this whooping would be in the duel where she beats Grave and is like "my name is Celaena Sardothien.." .. It was just awesome okay! Aside from being a kickass assassin she's also sassy and witty and all around hilarious, however I found her a little too arrogant for my liking but she tones in down the more it goes on and everyone has their flaws, plus it makes her who she is. Another thing I loved about her was she loved books which is an odd hobby for a killer but non the less a great addition to her character.
Chaol Westfell
I'll start off with the warning I think I'm in love with him. I'm not sure why either. He's Captain of the guard so he's all kickass and muscly which is something. He hides is emotions but still has them bottled up and he's funny but at the same time always serious and I have a stupid grin of my face every time he talks to Celaena.. I don't even know but I'm in love #TeamChaol
Dorian Havilliard
I was half expecting the crown prince to be like Joffery from GoT but it turns out that's his brother ;) He reminds me SO much of Adrian from Vampire Academy; rich, good looking, womeniser, charming, falls for the girl. I mean I like Dorian and I think he's funny and all .. but he's not Chaol. I feel like he's a bit too feely for me (yeah that's now a word xD) and wears his heart on his sleeve plus I think he fell in love too quickly.. I'm also probably just making excuses because he's not Chaol aha ;)
Nehemia Ytger
I'm going to be honest, I didn't like her at first. I'm still not overly fond of her but she's growing on me. I just found her a little rude at first where she was like "I hate everyone but you, Lillian because you can speak me language so I can slag everyone off to you" and then a little full off of herself when she was like "I'm not gonna lie, I saved your life because I'm super magical and awesome and I've been saving you're ass for weeks, it's been dreadfully exhausting!" .. okay so maybe she didn't say it exactly like that and she's not too bad I suppose.
Cain
Ew. There's no need for an explanation why I hate him and I totally knew I was him all along.. ha this kid ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The Plot
I loved how their were little sub plots to go along the main plot of the competition. Like the murder mysteries, the romances, the world problems and the magic. I was surprised actually how little it was focused on the competition because although it updated us on what the rankings were and stuff, it only showed us a few of the tests. Like the rest off this book, I loved the plot :)
Annnnnd.. I think that's pretty much it. This is definitely one of my favourite books by far and I'm so so excited for the rest of the series!!
Here's a fanart I did of Celaena and Chaol.. (Inspired by Linneart)
Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed ^.^
Don't forget to leave a comment if you've read this and what your thoughts were and if you have any recommendations I might enjoy.
Have a super fantastic day,
CYA!
- Alice :) xx
