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I wish so much that I could tell you I loved this book... but I just didn't.

After thinking A Court of Mist and Fury was such a huge improvement from A Court of Thorns and Roses, I was really excited for this third installment. I even preordered it. But I really struggled to get into the book from the very start. From pacing issues to awkward sex scenes that did nothing for me, it was one disappointment after another.

I've said this before but I really dislike Maas's sex scenes. At her best, she writes them strangely with words like "branding" and "claiming", but here they were just plain icky. With all the talk of "mates", "growling" and "purring", and the climaxing from stroking one another's wings, I felt like I'd walked in on two animals rutting in the mud. Ugh.

And another thing-- Feyre and Rhysand are already mated and loved up to their eyeballs so there was no sexual tension, no will they/won't they, which made the sex scenes so boring.

What's strange about these sex scenes is how they manage to somehow be both graphic and coy at the same time. Maas never actually uses explicit words. If a young kid picked up this book, they might assume Rhysand and Feyre were dancing or playing an instrument.

His touch turned different. Exploring. Broad strokes and feather-light ones, arches and swirls and direct, searing lines.

And her vagina is usually described as "there" or "where I want him". Then, at the same time, these scenes are weirdly overwritten, with her orgasm (obviously not called that) leaving her “skin glowing like a newborn star in its wake��. It's just really not my thing.

I was disappointed with the writing in general, to be honest. Maas seemed to write a lot more "tell" and a lot less "show" than usual. I was especially disappointed at the wasted opportunity for some underhanded manipulation in the first part. After how the last book ended, Feyre was kind of "undercover" at the start and in a position for lies and sneakiness. Except it was mostly her swanning around and quietly seething to herself about how much she hated Ianthe and how much of a douche Tamlin is. I thought this whole part was boring when it should have been extremely tense and exciting.

But I think the worst thing was the overall pacing. It's a long book, but I can normally sprint through Maas's works in a day, yet here it was such a slog. Especially the first half. It's taken up with a lot of character conversations and strategizing for the upcoming war with Hybern. It lacked a pull, a sense of urgency, some kind of tension to make me need to know what happens next.

I cannot believe they've announced another four books for this series. Why??? I can only hope they are some kind of spin-off series because, otherwise, either a) we will have to suffer through who the fuck knows how many more awkward, unsexy Feyre/Rhysand sex scenes, or b) Maas will destroy Rhys's character and hook Feyre up with yet another hot fae dude. I'm not sure which is more likely.

The later chapters of this book picked up in pacing, but I think it was too little, too late. This is a whopping 700-page monster and it obviously didn't need to be. I will say that I liked how things were left with Tamlin, but seeing as that part was only a few sentences long, it doesn't make up for everything else.

I'm thinking this is where I drop out of this series.

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