A Court of Thorns and Roses (Court of Thorns and Roses, #1)

by Sarah J. Maas

[Berls]

Original review (October 2015):
I knew that A Court of Thorns and Roses was a twist of Beauty and the Beast and the fae. But that was pretty much all I knew and as a result, I guess I didn’t really know what to expect. But A Court of Thorns and Roses was most definitely not what I expected. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – in fact, I really enjoyed it.

I think there were only two big negative in terms of what I was expecting. First was the fairytale retelling aspect. Typically when I read a retelling, I expect it to be a twist on the original fairytale… but this felt like it was just a twist on the Disney version. And isn’t that already it’s own retelling? But I LOVE the Disney version, so I’m not complaining exactly… but it is disappointing that it felt so familiar (though there were significant differences – particularly in the last quarter). The other thing that really bugged me – and this is something I can only allude to if I’m going to avoid spoilers – but there’s this riddle towards the end and I found it so incredibly easy to solve after hearing it just one time. Feyre is supposed to dwell on it for MONTHS and she finds it difficult. I don’t know, it just really bugged me.

But those are really my only criticisms for A Court of Thorns and Roses. I absolutely loved the world and I felt like Sarah J. Maas’s use of the fae was very well done. The characters were addicting and I had no trouble falling for Tamlin along with Feyre. Every character was pretty complex, even her family, who seem pretty simple at first glance end up surprising you as the story progresses. Every character seemed to have layers upon layers – at times I had a hard time because those I had decided I hated I was starting to seriously LIKE. I love complexity like that, it’s more real.

I had the privilege of listening to A Court of Thorns and Roses and the narration definitely helped bring these characters to life. Jennifer Ikeda did a great job with the voices – they were varied and helped me keep all the characters straight. I listened at 2x speed too, so her pacing worked well – I’m not able to speed up all narrators and still have a nice listen. So I’ll definitely be continuing this series on audio.

I’ll be interested to see how things continue – since it started as a fairytale retelling but the fairytale bit is done but there are future books planned. There’s no cliff hanger, but there are elements left enough in the air that you can see plenty of potential. I look forward to seeing how it will develop. Definitely worth a read – though I should note that while it’s selling as YA it has sex scenes that are more explicit than I would expect in a YA book. Just FYI.

Updated review (May 2021):
I think I agree with most my initial thoughts. I now know that it's not based solely on Beauty and the Beast, but also East of the Sun and West of the Moon, and Tam Lin. I'm not actually familiar with the later two fairy tales, but I'm guessing that they are responsible for the unfamiliar later half of the book (along with future books).

My other thing is that some of the characterizations of the Fae that I overlooked last time, kind of bothered me this time. One is kind of a spoiler but I won't say it, but it breaks one of the cardinal rules of the fae. In addition, Feyre thanks the Fae constantly. That's not commented on, but you're not supposed to thank the Fae. Put together, those two characterizations were kind of like when you make Vampires that don't drink blood (even the sparkly Cullens drank blood).

My rating stays the same and I'm really glad I reread the book - as I'm moving along in the series and I had forgotten so much!