Amanda Prado's Reviews > A Court of Mist and Fury

I can't believe the person who wrote A Court of Thorns and Roses wrote A Court of Mist and Fury.

Ok no, I can, because ACOTAR was a foundation book (like book 1 of Captive Prince was a foundation), and everything that happens here could only happen after the events of ACOTAR; but even then, book 1 was so boring and forgettable plot-wise - just because it's a foundation book doesn't mean it has to be boring and slow and nothing can happen until the last 10% of the story (again, see: book 1 of Captive Prince). ACOMAF, however, doesn't even know the meaning of boring. It's plot plot plot action action action the whole way through. It's always new characters being introduced, new places, plans within plans within plans. It's a great Hades/Persephone retelling, which lbr was the only thing I cared about going in, and even better, with the way it combines Hades/Persephone with Beauty & the Beast, it shows why I love retellings of the first one but dislike the second. It even gave me court politics and deceptions and a (pretending to be) evil power couple as its main characters! And then the ending promises even more deception and spy games and pretend!evil marrieds in the next book. YES. YEEEEEEEEEES.

It's not a perfect book, mind you. We have the usual SJM critiques: every male character is beautiful pretty sexy so manly so flirty wow im swooning etc. Everyone's a white heterosexual - there's attempts to diversify, but the diverse characters are the background of the background, so does it even count? No it doesn't lmao (give me more abt the married queens instead of just leaving it to subtext in the next book and I may forgive you, SJM). The prose still has some wtf moments. And of course we have the famed SJM Character Assassination (TM) of Tamlin, but I actually disagree on this one: everything Tamlin becomes here, already existed in the first book. He's not a new character; the actions he takes here are just the next step of the actions he took in ACOTAR. The problem is that SJM doesn't have one subtle bone in her body, and just slams the reader with "look how bad Tamlin is, look how Rhys is actually good" over and over again, to the point that it feels forced. If it wasn't so overdone, if SJM trusted her readers a bit more to understand her subtext, it'd be a better story. But it's still an entertaining one, and honestly I'm really hyped for the sequel. I'm a sucker for well done Hades/Persephone retellings, and this is shaping up to be a memorable one.