Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

Goodreads Blurb

After serving out a year of hard labor in the salt mines of Endovier for her crimes, 18-year-old assassin Celaena Sardothien is dragged before the Crown Prince. Prince Dorian offers her her freedom on one condition: she must act as his champion in a competition to find a new royal assassin.

Her opponents are men—thieves and assassins and warriors from across the empire, each sponsored by a member of the kings council. If she beats her opponents in a series of eliminations, she’ll serve the kingdom for three years and then be granted her freedom.

Celaena finds her training sessions with the captain of the guard, Westfall, challenging and exhilirating. But she’s bored stiff by court life. Things get a little more interesting when the prince starts to show interest in her... but it’s the gruff Captain Westfall who seems to understand her best.

Then one of the other contestants turns up dead... quickly followed by another. Can Celaena figure out who the killer is before she becomes a victim? As the young assassin investigates, her search leads her to discover a greater destiny than she could possibly have imagined.

So my first reaction to reading the summary (and I know I compared The Forsaken to Hunger Games too.): Sounds a lot like Grave Mercy, Poison Study, and The Hunger Games mixed together…interesting.

My reaction after I read it: WOW. THAT’S A LOT LIKE GRAVE MERCY, POISON STUDY, AND THE HUNGER GAMES MIXED TOGETHER. Who knew it could be this good?!

So even if the Throne of Glass reminded me of all three of those books, it was clearly original and one of the best High Fantasies I’ve read! I’ve always loved the idea of female assassins (hopefully, that doesn’t say anything about me) so when I heard of Throne of Glass, I immediately added it to my TBR pile. The idea of a castle made of glass and a girl assassin feared throughout the land made me squeal, but I was already a bit wary with the love triangle. I’ve read too many of those this year and I admit, I groaned a lot a bit.

Warning: Gushing will occur. You have been warned.

The thing about the romance is that even though the synopsis makes you think “Major love triangle”, that’s not the case at all. The romance was slow and sweet and just adorable (even with an assassin). Celaena desperately tries not to feel anything for them and I loved that it was steady and not even close to insta-love! Or an actual love triangle. There’s attraction there, but no “I love you, but I love him. Oh, I can’t decide!” thank goodness! So throne of Glass definitely has an amazing romance in there, not one that’s irrational.

The world building was as amazing as the rest of the book! With faeries and dead queens, other dimensions, old legends, and more it was definitely one of my favorite fantasy worlds. I loved the dimensions especially, and how each little thing fed another legend or old story and how those things influenced actions in the “real world”. My favorite place, no matter how unreasonable it is, had to be the glass castle! The descriptions were amazing and the world was thrilling and exciting! I mean, it felt as if Sarah J. Maas had actually visited the world.

Characters!  I loveloveloved Celaena! She was an amazing character! And no, not because she was an assassin. But ok, that had something to do with it! She was deadly and so stubborn and she just..she just…she was so childish too sometimes! Like, not the bad way. More like she acted like one of those adorable little girls! But that mainly had to do with her love of sweets. Where she ate one and a half pounds of candy. In the morning. Celaena made me laugh and I loved reading about her fighting skills and the clever remarks she made. She was definitely one of my favorite heroines of 2012!

As for our Prince, he was definitely the guy I was rooting for! While he was a prince and was supposed to be cold and disgusted by Celaena, he found himself fascinated by her and even though it went against his instincts, he started falling. Hard. And even if I loved him in the beginning, he started growing on me more and more as the story progressed. You learned more about him and his life and he just…agh!

But I have to admit, Captain Chaol was definitely swoon-worthy too! He kept his distance more and he knew his duty and believed in it a bit more. His loyalty to Dorian was amazing and he was incredibly sweet! But no matter how awesome he is, Dorian definitely has my heart!

The writing was amazing and I’m so glad that Sarah J. Maas decided to query it! I’ve visited Fiction Press…once a year? So it’s no wonder I never stumbled across it, though I would’ve loved to see how much the story has improved since then. It’s definitely inspiring that a published (Or very-soon-to-be-published) author started on Fiction Press like so many other writers!

Throne of Glass is definitely one you should add to your TBR pile and I can almost guarantee you’ll love it! Maas has a new voice and an enchanting stories filled with things in your wildest dreams. A few shaky things that I can't put my finger on, but in under five words…GO BUY IT!

Pages: 416

Series: Throne of Glass #1

Genre: High Fantasy/Romance

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Release Date: August 7

Rating: 4.5 ---> 5

"...she's wild. And unpredictable. She needs to learn to control her feelings--especially that impossible anger."