Kyrie
I'm a weird reader.
Often times in books, I find myself more drawn to the world of the story than the characters. Which, come to think of it, is probably why I end up gravitating towards fantasy as a genre.
A Court of Thorns and Roses is one of those cases where I was far more interested in the world than anything else.
I mean...Fayre and Tamlin were okay characters. I didn't hate them. I even found myself empathizing with Fayre's devotion to her family.
But they took a back seat to everything else in the story for me.
I've mentioned before, and I'm sure I'll mention again, that I love stories that do faeries justice - stories that know that “faery” does not refer to a single creature, but is a descriptor for an entire group of creatures. And not all of them are beautiful, or benevolent.
There are so many different types of faery in this book. I wish there had been more time to focus on them.
That's okay, though, because another thing that I really enjoy are retellings of the legend of Tam Lin. Well. Well-done ones, at any rate.
The book blends the story of Tam Lin with Beauty and the Beast, which makes sense. The biggest difference between the two stories is that Beauty gets forced to live with the Beast in order to save her family, where the heroine in the Tam Lin story finds him on her own, and undertakes the trials to save him of her own free will. Otherwise, they're both tales of a heroine overcoming a vague challenge in order to save their prince with the power of their love.
Fayre's story definitely leans closer to being Beauty and the Beast than Tam Lin. There are elements from both stories present, though. I especially enjoyed the nod to Tam Lin with the animal masks - in order to free Tam Lin in the original tale, the heroine has to find him in a parade of faeries, and hold on to him as he turns into three different animals. The reference made me smile.And speaking of references - I didn't hallucinate all of the Prydain Chronicles references, did I? The human world is Prythian, the faeries have a sacred cauldron and use the terms “cauldron born” and “cauldron blessed”. And at one point, Fayre compares humans to pigs when looked at next to the faeries.
Sorry. I got a bit off-track there.
I enjoyed the last third of the book the most. Fayre's captivity in the Spring Court dragged at times, becoming just a series of meals and paintings, but once she figured out what was actually going on, and set her goals to saving everybody, the story got awesome.
Awesome. I'm really going with that word choice? Eh. I'm tired while I'm typing this up, and just kind of narrating my train of thought.
The book started strong, slowed down in the middle, and then ended strong. I am wary of a potential future love triangle. I'm sure I'll read the next book in the series though, if only for another glimpse at the various faeries.
I'm a weird reader.
Often times in books, I find myself more drawn to the world of the story than the characters. Which, come to think of it, is probably why I end up gravitating towards fantasy as a genre.
A Court of Thorns and Roses is one of those cases where I was far more interested in the world than anything else.
I mean...Fayre and Tamlin were okay characters. I didn't hate them. I even found myself empathizing with Fayre's devotion to her family.
But they took a back seat to everything else in the story for me.
I've mentioned before, and I'm sure I'll mention again, that I love stories that do faeries justice - stories that know that “faery” does not refer to a single creature, but is a descriptor for an entire group of creatures. And not all of them are beautiful, or benevolent.
There are so many different types of faery in this book. I wish there had been more time to focus on them.
That's okay, though, because another thing that I really enjoy are retellings of the legend of Tam Lin. Well. Well-done ones, at any rate.
The book blends the story of Tam Lin with Beauty and the Beast, which makes sense. The biggest difference between the two stories is that Beauty gets forced to live with the Beast in order to save her family, where the heroine in the Tam Lin story finds him on her own, and undertakes the trials to save him of her own free will. Otherwise, they're both tales of a heroine overcoming a vague challenge in order to save their prince with the power of their love.
Fayre's story definitely leans closer to being Beauty and the Beast than Tam Lin. There are elements from both stories present, though. I especially enjoyed the nod to Tam Lin with the animal masks - in order to free Tam Lin in the original tale, the heroine has to find him in a parade of faeries, and hold on to him as he turns into three different animals. The reference made me smile.And speaking of references - I didn't hallucinate all of the Prydain Chronicles references, did I? The human world is Prythian, the faeries have a sacred cauldron and use the terms “cauldron born” and “cauldron blessed”. And at one point, Fayre compares humans to pigs when looked at next to the faeries.
Sorry. I got a bit off-track there.
I enjoyed the last third of the book the most. Fayre's captivity in the Spring Court dragged at times, becoming just a series of meals and paintings, but once she figured out what was actually going on, and set her goals to saving everybody, the story got awesome.
Awesome. I'm really going with that word choice? Eh. I'm tired while I'm typing this up, and just kind of narrating my train of thought.
The book started strong, slowed down in the middle, and then ended strong. I am wary of a potential future love triangle. I'm sure I'll read the next book in the series though, if only for another glimpse at the various faeries.