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Author- Sarah J.Maas
My Rating- 4 Stars (Books 1-4) 5 Stars (Book 5) Overview- Following a young Assassin's life through torment and torture and lonliess to new and powerful friends, self dicovery and how she moves through the story as a pawn used by immortal beings to shift the worlds future to their benefit. My Review- As a comeback to my blog I am reviewing this series a little differently to my reviews in the past. I did not want to review these seperately as I feel the entire story would have been just as fantastic as one large, epic fantasy that would have kept me gripped for days. Each book follows smoothly from the last and doesnt disappoint. |
Let me explain...
The first book seemed very young, but I believe this perfectly matched the characters in this time. Celaena Sardothien (who takes on many names during this series, but don't worry they are easy to understand. Sarah moves us smoothly through the books) is a little naive to the world despite already having faced many horrors and torment from various people and begins this story in an enslavement camp destined to be forgotten and left to die. She is incredibly strong but every character is a young teen, not quite ready for the roles they must play in the future. And so I believe that the language and style this is written in puts this across nicely. As the books move on and the heros and heroines grow older, the language and style subtly changes to accomodate this.
The characters are developed slowly but surely following their adolescence in to young adulthood and the new experiences and passions around them. Especially as the Fae men are introduced and their natural alpha ways are challenged daily by the strong female characters.
Every new character introduced to us has a purpose in the series, has developement and depth and while I think some plot lines are rounded off too perfectly there are many situations in these books that leave you too emotional to turn the page. I quickly grew attached to so many players in this series that I became invested in whether they lived or died, suffered emotionally or just wanted to tell them they would be alright. Even those who begin their journeys as enemies.
In my opinion, if characters can do that to me, then these are winners. I want these emotions while reading. I want to believe I'm living in these worlds and I haven't felt this way about a series since Cassandra Clare's The Mortal Instruments and Infernal Devices.
I love the world building. I was never overloaded with detail or pages upon pages of description. As a reader I like to fill that with imagination. The dialogue is perfect. No rambling conversations unless there is an important piece of back story or past event we must learn about. It's snappy, witty and purely entertaining. Celaena is funny and sarcastic, she is intelligent and slick. The way she maneuvers around the villains and friends is so fun to read. And her romantic interest in this book (whom I adore far too much) suffers much during her more playful moments, yet cares for her with every part of his being. He loves her for exactly who and what she is. Celaena is a friend everyone wants, her loyalty is unshakable.
This series, in my honest opinion, is perfect for easy reading and has a fantastic plotline and characters and romance and everything you could ask for from a young adult (with a few naughty bits) epic fantasy. So I reccomend it to all those who stumble upon this blog and I hope you will share your thoughts and feelings about it in the comments section below. I love talking about books and look forward to it!