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“Only you can decide what breaks you, Cursebreaker. Only you.��

For a book of 700 pages, this had very little to tell. Which sounds unbelievable, but underneath its overwhelming plot full of action and flashy characters, nothing about A Court of Wings and Ruin really stood out to me. The battles weren’t very tense, people had little character development, no heavy losses…Just what kind of finale is this?!

Warning: Spoilers coming up!

I’d love to write a full rant about all the faults I found in this book, but since others already did a fantastic job with that, I’ll point you to the reviews of Emma and Em, and Sam’s gripe/gush discussion on her channel.
Instead, I’m going to focus on my biggest problem with this book: the “WAR�� part of ACOWAR.

The big bad war is on everyone’s mind during the whole book, but it’s only after 480 pages we finally get to it. 480 pages = more than half of this book! And during those pages, not much interesting even happens! We get to know Nesta and Elain and their powers, there is more world-building with the other Courts and their High Lords, and Feyre pays a few visits to the Bone Carver and the Weaver.

Fun! But since all of these events are spread out so thin, they lose their strength to the plot. Instead we spend the biggest part of the book reading about problems with ‘mates��, the search for Miryam and Drakon, Lucien’s origins, Feyre learning to fly, etc. �� I don’t care! Get to the battle with Hybren already!

Yet when we get to the War, there is nothing to it. War is supposed to be an event that shows (an)other side of characters, how it can push good people to do bad things and vice versa. War is rarely a good vs. bad battle, but a fight with many shades of grey, with heavy sacrifices to pay before you can get peace.
But do we get any of these in this book? NO! NONE! Everyone survives! All the main characters and human side-characters all live: only the ‘monsters�� and Feyre’s dad (lol, anyone remember him?!) die, and their deaths are stupid and add nothing to the plot. Neither does Amren’s sudden romance with Varian (who?) and Mor’s shoehorned confession. “Look guys, I’m inclusive!�� No, you’re not Maas: this represenation feels forced as hell.

I also found every character’s moral very black and white. Feyre and the good guys only do good things and make no mistakes, while the bad guys are all evil ‘just because��, and the bad women are all slut-shamed. Feyre destroyed the Spring Court with her spying and yet she never feels any remorse for the people who suffered because of that; yet Eris �� Mor’s fiancé who tortured and abused her �� gets a redemption arc. WTF how is any of this acceptable?!

So hence this book gets its’s 2 stars: I didn’t loathe it, but this beast of a finale was filled with constant over-the-top writing, flat characters, and a war with little danger and too many deus ex machina’s. What a disappointing ending :(



Read here my other reviews of the A Court of Thorns and Roses trilogy:
#1 A Court of Thorns and Roses |#2 A Court of Mist and Fury