Crown of Midnight (Throne of Glass, 2)

I read the first book in this series about three years ago and was seriously underwhelmed. It felt overlong and a bit derivative and I didn't feel much spark with either of the romantic interests. I never had any inclination to read the sequels. And then, earlier this year, someone persuaded my to read the author's other series, A Court of Thorn and Roses, and it was one of my favourite reads of the year. So slightly reluctantly, I decided to give this series another go. Across the board, this book was better than its predecessor. The heroine was more nuanced and developed, the main love interest had grown more attractive and the plot was more interesting, with more focus on the magic, the world and the backstory. It had lots of twists and turns and some quite shocking moments. It wasn't as good as the newer series, but it was very enjoyable. Without giving too much away, it ends with two revelations/twists, one of which I'd suspected, one of which was a total surprise. As they were both things the main character knew but that had never been mentioned in her narrative, it was rather jarring, but definitely got me racing to pick up the next book.

I am a Sarah J. Maas fan and I loved ‘The Court’ series, so I was excited to step into the ‘Throne of Glass’ series but this just hasn’t hit the mark as well as ‘The Court’ series did for me. Saying that, this was a good next instalment. Crown of Midnight takes a step away from the romantic drama of its predecessor and opens up a story that is bigger and bloodier. Celaena gets to explore all aspects of what it means to be an assassin in this book; she is tested constantly and you can see her growing and changing and learning as the story progresses. And this story is one tumultuous journey of extremely high ups and unbelievably low downs with Celaena taking relationships to all new levels and watching others fall apart. Old enemies resurface and we start to get a glimpse of just how big the picture Maas is painting for us actually is. A couple of disappointing parts for me - how is Celaena the best assassin in the world but gets caught out all the time? It felt like there wasn’t a chapter that went past where she hadn’t been snuck up on, followed or knocked out. It felt really strange to me. Also - the pace. It felt slow, like really slow. There seemed to be a lot of doing nothing and waiting for stuff to happen. The pros - the characters. What an interesting bunch. I enjoyed the scenes with Celaena and Chaol and also the scenes with Dorian. There is an interesting dynamic between these three especially and I look forward to seeing how that plays out. Also - the storyline and world building, it feels like there is a lot of drama ahead. Overall, this wasn’t as gripping to me as the first one but we’ve been set up nicely for the next one in the series and I’ll move onto that after reading another book in between.

Headlines: Colour me surprised I wasn't spoiled for the massive twist Unexpected love from me to this book Truly invested in the characters So a little recap...I read Throne of Glass 3-4 years ago and it left me with a meh feeling and lack of impetus to carry on. Then ACOTAR happened, followed by CC and well, I like this woman's stories. I decided ages ago to give this series a second chance but it took some prodding from book buddy Amy to make it happen. Clearly she only had my best interest in mind. I read a recap of book one, launched in and honestly, it was easy to get into it from the off. I call TOG one long world build, whereas this book was more juice in the story, better characterisation. I really liked Celeana as I got to know her and her motivations better. The unfolding magic kept me interested throughout. I totally shipped Celeana and Chaol and I grew to like Dorian more. I had very mixed feelings about Nehemia, Asher and obviously the king. Mort was fun and the Elena too. Baba Yellowlegs reminded me how good Maas is at writing the creepy, chilling villains. I cannot believe I haven't been spoiled for that massive twist we got and I'm so pleased about that, even though I did have a brief thought in the right direction. I'm truly excited to read on.

Yaaaaaaaaaaas Sarah J Maas Ok, I know this is an older series and I'm way behind buuuut I can't wait to read the next book. After becoming the Kings champion, Celaena is tasked with seeking out and killing those who the King feels need to be assassinated. However, Celaena is anything but loyal to the King of Adarlan and deceives him from the very start of this book. Then she is tasked with killing an old acquaintance Archer Finn and Celaena must make some difficult decisions. When disaster strikes, Celaena must decide who and what is most important to her and her future. I started reading the ToG series after reading the ACOTAR series and falling head over heels in love with it. Having never read Fantasy before, I decided at the age of 26 to give it a go and then ACOTAR made me wonder why I'd never read this genre before. Anyway... I read Throne of Glass and felt really underwhelmed. I found Celaena really irritating, self obsessed and a bit pathetic when she was allegedly the best assassin in Adarlan. The first 100 or so pages, I still felt the same; her batting her eyelashes at any male and toying with Chaol and Dorian yet again. Then BAM sh** just got real. I flew through the second half of the book and enjoyed it so much. The relief! I wanted to love this series, now I can say that I am very invested. I purposely read no spoilers so was shocked at the revelations in the last few pages of the book. Admittedly Celaena still isn't my favourite protagonist, but she's growing on me!

*flails* This book was so good. I liked Throne of Glass, but I LOVED Crown of Midnight. (!!!) Watch out below for some spoilers if you haven't read Throne of Glass yet. Ten Likes/Dislikes: 1. (+) Celaena, the protagonist - Celaena and I haven't had the best of pasts. When I first read Throne of Glass, I thought she was too arrogant - so arrogant that I found it hard to identify with her, so arrogant that I never really believed in the danger that she faced. My wishes were granted, though: you do find out more of Celaena's past, and you do get more into her head in Crown of Midnight. She's still bold and brash, clever and witty, strong and assertive, and yes, quite able to defend herself (and thus proves herself as an assassin and King's Champion)--but where she shines in this novel, it's none of those things. It's when she finally shows some vulnerability, some doubt, some emotion, and that actually made me want to hug her. That got me rooting so much for her that it was nearly inconceivable that I didn't like her before. So if you loved Celaena in Throne of Glass, you will ache for her in this novel. If you weren't her greatest fan in Throne of Glass, maybe you'll like her in Crown of Midnight. 2. (+) World-building - You wanted more on Adarlan and life outside the court and in Rifthold? How about the political system? How about the magic and the King's nefarious plots? How about Elena's history and the beasts we found in Throne of Glass? There's that and much, much more. One of my favorite things about the Throne of Glass series is that there's so much to be discovered in the world, little details about the food and city that give it a different feel besides the usual medieval aspects of high fantasy. These are the kind of details that you can feel and appreciate as a reader but don't have to analyze (though Shannon does quite well in the linked blog post). Yeah, there are some epic fantasy cliches, but they never feel old and too much. Ms. Maas does a great job reinventing old tropes into her own world. 3. (+) Romance - Undoubtedly, the romance will anger some fans as Celaena makes a clear decision in this novel but isn't too tactful about that decision. Personally, I wasn't a huge fan of the non-interest (not just romantic-wise but also character-wise), so while I recognized that Celaena and Chosen One could have done better, I still reveled in the slow-burn that soon came to pass. Most of all, I was just happy that there wasn't the same level of love triangle as in the first book. Both Dorian and Chaol spend some parts in the beginning fantasizing or moping about Celaena but not for too long. And the best part of it is that the romance is one of a few things that forces development of these three characters and fits unexpectedly into the plot. This novel is a much darker, more mature novel than its predecessor, so i...