I promise I will be as objective as possible in this review. I have seen and heard of a lot of reviews on all points in the spectrum when it comes to A Court of Thorns and Roses. A lot, in all honesty, are subjective and opinionated even when they claim to be factual. You cannot fully remove bias from something for you intrinsically make bias decisions in everyday thoughts and actions. Herein lies my review and I hope you enjoy.

I will start by stating something possibly controversial but nevertheless, in my opinion, true. A Court of Thorns and Roses, as a book, isn’t that bad. In fact, its a decent book. The settings are well established and the description, in all their sensory involvement, contribute to a rich and clear illustration of these spaces. The harsh winter harrowing the human realm where we start our read feels deadly as it should. The borderline impoverished state of the village, or at least the side of the village the family now resides in, gives off that desperate hunger and lack of essentials to further justify the ideas and themes rooted in this space. Once inside the Spring Court, the liveliness – even if its far lesser than what it would be – is a heavy contrast to the human realm. You will find it hard to pick away at the description of the lands in search of plot holes or inconsistencies.

That isn’t to say there isn’t any. Something that I found to be distracting, though this verges on subjective but pertains to a very important plot point I will mention next so I want to bring it up for context, is the timeline of the family’s fall into poverty. Feyre says that her mother died when she was eight, and that when she was eleven her father made a gamble on their wealth with those shipments over the ocean to the continent which went south, resulting in them losing their most of their fortunes and their house. One of the biggest areas of discrepancy I have with this is Feyre’s illiteracy.

Feyre claims to have very basic reading and writing skills which we can assume she garnered up until the age of eight through some sort of tutor or schooling, right? Being a well-off family, the Archerons would have access to such providers for their girls, right? My issue with this is that Feyre’s very simple reading and writing skills does not correlate to that of an eight year old. Once we begin learning to read and write, we start to work out word patterns through speech and we can start making sense of letter combinations and sounds. That, paired with her access to a tutor and books that may or may not have belonged to a study or library within their manor, should mean that she has been able to gain an average grasp on language, both reading and writing it, for her age. Keep in mind that Tamlin notes that her diction is rather impressive which would contribute to the belief that Feyre can speak well.

The reason I bring this up is because, as I mentioned, her illiteracy is a major plot point with great significance for the novel’s trajectory. It almost becomes part of her identity it’s so important (that and the continual mention of her golden-brown hair even though we’re halfway through the book and don’t need to be reminded what her hair colour is – subjective opinion, I’m sorry). What doesn’t stack up is the following scene. Chapter 13 – Feyre sits in Tamlin’s study sounding out a sentence, struggling over a view words before she gets stumped on the word position. she underlines it and writes it down to check how it’s pronounced later on before looking over at the walls and seeing these massive murals. Tell me how she is able to say that something is effervescent if she is unable to get her head around the pronunciation of position? You’re telling me she’s able to get the pronunciation and understanding of the word effervescent but she hasn’t heard the word position spoken enough times to get how it sounds? This is a piece of the puzzle that isn’t fitting – either she’s illiterate with a basic vocabulary, or that which is directly related to her everyday life hunting for her family, or she has the capacity to understand complex words and where they would apply, thus providing her a decent grasp on language and, furthermore, a greater understanding of written and spoken language as a result. It cannot go both ways.

There are some small details, such as the use of the nickname Tam where is isn’t right (she uses his full name on either side of this nickname in the same paragraph) and little things that may lean closer to subjective opinions with wider context and connections to later books to address, such as how Rhysand treats her Under the Mountain (I won’t get into that here, you can read my ACOMAS to see what I mean) but otherwise, from a storywriting standpoint, ACOTAR isn’t that bad. Some characters are a little weak and one dimensional for my tastes, as are some perceptions and beliefs that Feyre has which further solidify her as a character I do not vibe with, but the structure and flow of the story works well. It’s a solid 4/5 book in my opinion for a YA reader, and let me restate it for the masses, a YA fantasy reader. Some foreshadowing and details are a little heavy handed and blatantly obvious for quite some time before they are integral to a character’s actions or decisions. That’s perfectly fine.

Rest assured, my lovely reader, for this sentiment does not continue into the rest of the series. I knew going into this that my preferred book of the series is ACOTAR, that I do not even view ACOFAS as a book, and that it only goes downhill from here. If you’re wanting a review to justify why you don’t like the series, perhaps my take will give your thoughts something to bond with. I will continue to be as objective as possible throughout my review of this series but I will let you know now and at the beginning of each of the following posts that things will not be so clean-cut and non-biased. I have strong opinions about these characters and books and I will be vocalising them.