When nineteen-year-old huntress Feyre kills a wolf in the woods, a beast-like creature arrives to demand retribution for it. Dragged to a treacherous magical land she only knows about from legends, Feyre discovers that her captor is not an animal, but Tamlin—one of the lethal, immortal faeries who once ruled their world.
As she dwells on his estate, her feelings for Tamlin transform from icy hostility into a fiery passion that burns through every lie and warning she's been told about the beautiful, dangerous world of the Fae. But an ancient, wicked shadow grows over the faerie lands, and Feyre must find a way to stop it . . . or doom Tamlin—and his world—forever.
SPOILER FREE REVIEW
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Prior to A Court of Thorns and Roses, I had never read a novel written by Sarah J. Maas and now that I have, I can't wait to get my hands on her other series, Throne Of Glass, not to mention the highly anticipated sequel to this one that comes out sometime in the following year of 2016. Reading this book was a new experience for me as I have also previously not read a New Adult book before but according to many great reviews by booktubers on YouTube, I felt a need to buy it and accustom myself to Maas' literature. As I had hoped, I was not disappointed and this book has turned out to be such a favourite of mine that it's still reeling in my head long after the last page was finished.
Feyre is such an amazing character: through her hardship of being so young and losing not only her family status––shoving her and her family from the riches of the world down to live as a commoner––but losing her mother as well. For many that would take it's toll, but it gave her a sense of leadership and helped her learn to provide for her family when nobody else would, even if it meant suffering her learning time. She goes through such a powerful transformation too as her view of the fae people is turned completely upside down and she realises that they are not as horrible as she was made to believe by the humans where she lived with her two older sisters and crippled father. From beginning to end, Feyre not only develops in the way she thinks, but throughout the novel she slowly changes from a young nineteen year old girl into a woman who realises her true potential and starts to see the silver linings in life, as living in such a poor state back with her family dimmed out any possibilities of a much better life of which come into view whilst being taken to the Spring Court on the other side of the wall.
The relationship between Feyre and Tamlin isn't forced like most books tend to portray and that's what I particularly like about this novel. Maas gives her enough time to adjust to the situation so that she slowly starts to see Tamlin and his friend, Lucien with better eyes instead of thinking about them with such hate generated from the stories of faeries that Feyre grew up hearing about. The best thing about it was that towards the end I felt like the connection between the two was genuine and not just something forged for the greater good of the storyline - the relationships in the story felt real and true to the characters and their emotions. I feel the same with how Feyre developed eventually with Lucien as a friend because it took a deal of time for them to built up trust in each other in order for certain events to happen in the book and that's what made it so much more gripping than any novel I've read before.
Overall I absolutely loved this book because the writing felt like poetry. Yes, felt. I felt everything she wrote and the way she described everything had every one of my senses tingling for more. Maas did the most amazing job with this book and I rate it a 5 out of 5 because I personally felt that there was no fault in it. There was not one part that I didn't like and I can assure you that if you love dark fantasy, faeries, a strong female heroine and a sexy, passionate love story then this story is perfect for your taste buds.
