A Court of Wings and Ruin: Sarah J. Maas

We meet again!

Are you the kind of person that can read multiple books at once, or are you a one story at a time type? I’m definitely the one story gal. I also have to finish a series (if all of the books are out) before I can move on. I don’t like the hopping around. Anyway, that had nothing to do with this, so here we go :)

Brief Synopsis:

Feyre’s back at the Spring Court and she’s definitely not having a good time. She knew that it was what she had to do to save literally everyone that she loves from Hybern’s grasp for a little longer, but it didn’t make the decision any easier. She’s pretending that Rhys had her under a spell and that she’s so grateful to be back with Tamlin, while the mere sight of him actually makes her a little bit queasy. (which, same, sister) There are some that aren’t buying her little act, though: Lucien for one, the ever-awful Ianthe for another, and Alis for a third.

However, nobody tries to call her bluff outright and Feyre is happy about that, because she’s got a plan: she’s going to take down the Spring Court from the inside. She’s finally done playing nice with Tamlin and she’s going to show him, in no uncertain terms, that she’s not his little plaything any longer. Though it kills her to be away from Rhysand and the others, she knows that this is something that has to be done for her to finally have some peace. She weaves the web very intricately and subtly. She’s not expecting Jurian and siblings from Hybern’s court to show up and visit, but she figures she may as well use them to her advantage as well.

Feyre and Lucien begin showing Jurian and the siblings the slight holes in the wall, a part of their journey to whatever goal of Hybern’s.

A few trips in, things take a number of turns. Thinking that she has the upper hand, Feyre begins asking the siblings some leading questions, getting answers about Hybern that they had not had before. She casually tosses the apple she was enjoying and walks away, ready to escape and go back to Rhys once and for all, with a story in her head of the siblings attacking her and Tamlin and Ianthe doing nothing, when she hears Ianthe tormenting Lucien.

A huge part of her tells her to keep fleeing, that Lucien had failed her many times, but she turns back and saves him from Ianthe’s disgusting plans (really, she’s such a hag). However, this gives the siblings time to corner the both of them and inform them that they’ve been slowly and cleverly poisoning everyone at the Spring Court just enough that their powers are muted and unusable for a time. The apple Feyre was eating? It had more of the poison and the siblings told her she was just minutes away from it taking full effect.

Feyre’s finally had enough and she attacks. The fight is brutal and quick and, with Lucien’s help, the siblings aren’t alive much longer. He begs Feyre to take him with her, though they’re both loathe to trust one another at this point, because of the mating bond that he felt with her sister Elain when she was turned. Reluctantly, she agrees and they set off on their own slow journey, just trying to survive until their magic finally comes back and she can reach out to her own people and get home once again.

While on the journey, they have to travel through the Autumn Court and end up being tracked by Lucien’s awful brothers. A fight ensues, and just enough of Feyre’s power comes back that she saves them once, but they’re caught by them again. When it seems as if Lucien’s brothers will overpower them, FINALLY, Azriel and Cassian show up and they’re beyond ticked that these morons from the Autumn Court would dare attack their High Lady. Since Lucien helped out during the battle, they decide to take him with him and she’s finally back home in Velaris with everyone she loves. But her sisters are still not recovered, Elain the most of all, basically a husk of who she used to be.

That, coupled with the fact that the war with Hybern ever-looms, they know that they have a ton of work ahead of them. The group try to navigate through making bonds and alliances while also staying in each other’s good graces, and it’s no easy task. Meanwhile, Feyre and her sister Nesta both have agreed to train in different ways to prepare for the war. They believe that something Nesta took with her from the Cauldron when she was changed will help repair the wall, so she begins training her mind with Amren. With her shapeshifting abilities, Feyre continues building her strength with Cassian while also accepting flying lessons from Azriel, wanting to be as prepared as possible when the battle finally ensues.

Lucien also finds a way to make himself useful when they learn that one of the human queens is still alive, though they thought her to be dead and had never met her before. He volunteers to go and find her, as it seems that she could be helpful in the fight ahead. They send Lucien off and honestly guys, I know he messed up a ton, but I miss him already.

Hybern attacks the Summer Court though nobody saw it coming, and although there’s a death wish on Rhys, Feyre and Amren’s heads, they know that they have to help. They rush to the aid of the Summer Court and, side by side with Morrigan, Feyre fights her way through the Hybern soldiers terrorizing all of the fae there. With the assistance of Rhys’s people, the Summer Court walks way with much less damage than they would have incurred. Following this, a meeting of all of the High Lords takes place at the Dawn Court, which seems to be the only one that at least one of the High Lords doesn’t have a big issue with.

We all knew that all them being back together would be problematic, but this is something else. Tamlin shows up, for one, and it seems like his only real purpose in being there is to goad Rhysand and Feyre and speak down to Feyre the entire time. Feyre does realize that she might have been too harsh turning everyone away from Tamlin, but I genuinely have the hardest time feeling anything for him anymore. He’s not the only problem; none of the High Lords seem quick to want to trust one another, least of all Lucien’s awful father Boren. Things get so bad with Boren that not only does Azriel attack, and almost kill, Lucien’s brother Eris, but Feyre herself ends up attacking Boren, revealing that she has a power from each of the High Lords.

While they’re at the Dawn Court, but back in their own quarters, High Lord Helion comes to visit and Feyre finds out that his hard façade is just that: he’s actually quite agreeable in real life, and very fond of Mor, Azriel AND Cassian. Through his stories, Feyre also makes a startling discovery: she’s pretty certain that Lucien is actually Helion’s son, not Boren’s. Which, thank God.

While they’re trying to get all of the High Lords to band together, the unthinkable happens: the wall is fallen by the Cauldron and Hybern doesn’t have much standing in their way anymore. So, it’s battle time. In the first battle, they greatly had the advantage. The second battle, not so much, and Feyre is tired of standing on the sidelines, so she figures out something else that she can do: find the Suriel once again and ask where the majority of Hybern’s soldiers are hiding.

Ianthe, the clever little bitch, had put a tracking spell on the cloak she’d given the Suriel and found both the Suriel and Feyre pretty much helpless in the woods, attacking them both and killing the poor Suriel, who I liked despite being super creepy. Ianthe gets her, though, and in a super satisfying (which probably shows more about my own mental psyche than it should) Feyre leads her and the two guards with her to their demise.

Guys, it doesn’t get any better after this. I forgot to mention that Elain had led brought them back to her mortal betrothed to beg for sanctuary for the other mortals, but it goes really, really bad and honestly, that douche bag is just lucky that Nesta didn’t rip his throat out in front of everyone. They do find Jurian, there, though, and they find out that maybe he wasn’t as bad as they all thought.

I can’t even get into the final battle, you guys, I can’t. Okay, I can. I can tell you that it looks super bleak for them and when it literally seems like it’s all done, it isn’t. I can tell you that Feyre proved that she IS that bitch and she made alliances with more than one dark creature to fight with them, as did Rhys, and that at the very, very last second, so many alliances that they hadn’t counted on finally came through clutch and helped them in ways they didn’t know. I’ll also tell you that I thought one of their own had betrayed them and then was lost forever.

This book.

My Rating: Solid 10/10. Thus far, this was one of my favorites. I do think that I’ve already liked A Court of Silver Flames more, but it’s always nice to see the aftermath.

Devastation Rating: You know what, I want to give it a higher rating, but I’ll say 6.5/10 because even though everything seemed so bleak, our faves made it out.

Favorite Quote(s):

“We don’t have the luxury of good ideas – only picking between the bad ones.”

“I tried to remember the usual fit of my soul in my body, the priority of things, my way of looking at the world.”

“If he was sweet, terrifying darkness, I was the glittering light that only his shadows could make clear.”

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Until next time <3