Book Review: Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

Title: Throne of Glass

Author: Sarah J. Maas

Publication date: August 7, 2012

404 pages


View the full synopsis on Goodreads!

Celaena Sardothien is a teenaged prisoner slaving away in a salt mine. Before that, she was the greatest assassin in all of Erilea. When the crown prince sends for her, it is to give her a chance to prove that she’s still the best. If she manages to defeat the other contenders for the title, she will be granted her freedom after four years of service to the king—the king who allegedly banished magic from the land, and whose thirst for conquest threatens to tear Erilea apart. And while Celaena trains for the trials to be the King’s Champion, another evil is rising, and Celaena may be the only one who can stop it.

This is another one that I wasn’t sure I was going to love, simply because while I love fantasy, it’s a genre that has a remarkable ability to go off the rails really fast, especially when faeries get involved. That said, I REALLY LIKED THIS BOOK A LOT, YOU GUYS. Celaena is not what you’d expect the heroine of a novel like this to be. She’s tough, yeah, but she loves dresses and baths and emotionally terrorizing people in positions of authority. She’s been through so much while still being so young, but she hasn’t let it destroy her. She’s not a stereotypical Tragedy-Hath-Turned-Me-Into-A-Heartless-Ice-Queen, and I really enjoyed her a lot.

The other characters are stellar, too. I love the Captain of the Guard, Chaol, so much. There is clearly a love triangle kind of set up between Celaena, Chaol, and the crown prince, Dorian. However, it’s done surprisingly well and I can see what she likes a lot about both of them (that said, Chaol all the way. Dorian is fine, I guess, but come on). I think my favorite secondary character was the princess Nehemia. She’s subtle and fierce and theirs is a female friendship done right. I would read a million books of the two of them trolling the king’s guard together.

I would talk about Elena, but I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just say that any time Elena appears my face is basically a giant, gleeful emoticon.

Definitely grade A, and considering that I’m getting the next book in the series put on hold as I type this, you should definitely give it a try.

-Kayla

Want to grab Throne of Glass for yourself? You can find it in the CMRLS catalog!