It feels like it’s been an age since we last had an instalment of Crescent City released into the world. But, the wait is FINALLY over… House Of Flame And Shadow (HOFAS) is out NOW!
I managed to finish this in three days so that I could avoid spoilers.
Below you will be able to read through my thoughts with zero worry on seeing spoilers, so don’t worry!
Expect a lot of rambling, I’m still not fully finished gathering my thoughts.
House Of Flame And Shadow
A WORLD IN DARKNESS.
A BURNING SPARK.
A BLAZE OF STARS.
Bryce Quinlan is stranded in a strange new world. She’s going to need all her wits about her to get home again and return to everything she loves. But that’s no easy feat when she has no idea who to trust.
Meanwhile, Hunt Athalar is back in the Asteri’s dungeons. Stripped of his freedom and the happiness he’d fought so hard for, he’s without a clue as to Bryce’s fate. Hunt is desperate to help his mate, but until he can escape the Asteri’s chains, his hands are quite literally tied.
If you’re reading this and you’re new to the series or the author. House Of Flame And Shadow is the third instalment of the Crescent City Series by Sarah J Maas. I personally don’t recommend reading this article further until you have read the first two just so you can understand fully what is about to be discussed.
You can grab the first two books here
Spoiler Free thoughts
How do I even begin to express how much I loved this book!??
This has been my most anticipated book for the longest time and I was so worried that it wouldn’t live up to the hype I had set up in my head, but it most certainly did.
The multiple POV and storylines that run through this really keep you enthralled. Similar to the Throne Of Glass series, you find yourself following multiple storylines all culminating to the major plot.
With multiple POV storytelling, I usually find myself more interested in one characters journey more than the other. However, HOFAS really kept me intrigued throughout! This is definitely a first for me.
Let’s just take a moment and thank SJM for writing characters such as Lidia, Tharion, Ithan and Jesiba. These in particular really made the book for me. Having the side characters take a more prominent role really had me. Their character development really took a turn and I loved it.
Bryce’s journey throughout this book was definitely what we all wanted to follow (no surprise there considering she’s the main protagonist and how book two left off) but having a break from her journey to meet back up with the rest of the characters was quite refreshing and helped make her story arc last that little bit longer.
With the previous Crescent City books, I found the pacing to be rather slow but with this instalment it really sped up. So expect a much faster paced, action packed book.
Overall, I cannot express fully how much I loved this book. It was everthing I wanted, I needed, and more!
Firstly, this is your last warning, this will contain spoilers. specifically for book one & two. I will try to avoid major spoilers for HOFAS still.
Having Nesta, Azriel, Amren and Rhys together with Bryce really got me so, so excited the moment I finished book two. So to jump straight back into it was a real treat. Whilst I wasn’t a fan of how the Inner Circle were treating Bryce, I could understand why they were untrusting and rather rude to Bryce.
I just wish we had more of their interactions as I felt it was cut short – understandably as the book is not part of the ACOTAR series but still.. personally I was hoping for a little bit more. But I think that’s just me being rather greedy.
Lidia was the most kick-ass character that I loved the most in this book. Finding more about her and not her as The Hind, really had me captivated and that ending!! I cannot deal with it.
Her twist actually made me gasp and I am excited to see where this all goes. Whilst I won’t be going into further detail about this as it is a spoiler.
Having such a build up of the world and the characters in book one & two, this one really kicked up the carnage and it was a long time coming, with much appreciation from me, as a reader!
Having originally DNF (Did Not Finish) book one, I never thought I would truly love this series, but HOFAS really helped me fall completely in love with this series and characters. Whilst I always thought Bryce & Hunt were the weakest in terms of my preference of characters in the Maas-verse. This book really stepped up and delivered the Maas characters we all deserve and are use to with Throne Of Glass and A Court Of Thorns And Roses.
Right I’m rambling on and I think you all get the idea. I loved this book so much!
