Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas Series: Throne of Glass #1
on August 2nd 2012
Genres: Young Adult, Love & Romance, Action & Adventure, General, Fantasy & Magic, Royalty
Pages: 432
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Meet Celaena Sardothien.Beautiful. Deadly. Destined for greatness.
In the dark, filthy salt mines of Endovier, an eighteen-year-old girl is serving a life sentence. She is a trained assassin, the best of her kind, but she made a fatal mistake. She got caught.
Young Captain Westfall offers her a deal: her freedom in return for one huge sacrifice. Celaena must represent the prince in a to-the-death tournament - fighting the most gifted thieves and assassins in the land. Live or die, Celaena will be free. Win or lose, she is about to discover her true destiny. But will her assassin's heart be melted?
Let me just start off by saying that I LOVED this book to pieces!! Back in the day, fantasy and high fantasy was all I ever read. When I was younger I used to write — short stories, beginnings of stories, etc — and almost always it would be fantasy. It’s the first genre I loved and is still the genre that I love the most. However, I haven’t read much fantasy lately! It’s a shame. Throne of Glass reminded me just how much I LOVE this genre and why it’s my favorite!
Firstly, I couldn’t wait to dive in after the novellas because I just had to know what was going to happen to Celaena. It picks up right where the novella left off — she is in the salt mines, doing hard labor. However, she is being picked by Prince Dorian to be a part of a competition where the competitors will fight each other until one emerges as the winner. The winner becomes the royal assassin. If she manages to beat everyone out, she’ll serve her royal assassin term but then, Dorian promises her that he’ll grant her freedom.
And from there, Celaena gets swept to the glass castle and into a swirl of court intrigue, a prince who may fancy her and a strong, quiet Captain of the Guard who helps train her. Oh, and a mysterious killer. Yes. The competitors are dying off, being killed and no one knows the cause.
You guys. I adored Celaena. Kickass, strong, funny heroine and did I mention she loves books and shopping? I just love strong heroines and Celaena definitely stepped up to the plate! The world building is phenomenal — no info dumps, the world unfolded as you read, and I adored the fantasy setting. I really do think the novellas add a lot to the background knowledge of the world and Celaena (but obviously not necessary — you just need to read it because I said so). Everything about this was just amazing. Seriously. INCLUDING the love triangle. This book had the most well done love triangle I have ever read. I was honestly split about my feelings and the love triangle did not take over the story but was seamlessly a part of it.
I couldn’t put this book down and read late into the night. It has all the elements of a fantastic fantasy story — strong plot, characters that I loved, intriguing action and romance. If you haven’t read this, or if you’ve been meaning to and haven’t (that was me!), get your butt into gear!! I ADORED IT.
“you just need to read it because I said so” I love it! Lol. I really do need to read the novellas because you know how I feel about this series. 🙂
I can’t wait to read this one. I used to read almost exclusively fantasy and high fantasy too. I’m glad to hear that you enjoyed this one. 🙂
I still haven’t read this book yet, and I’m kicking myself! I’ve seen so many great reviews for it, and my coblogger recently posted a glowing review of the sequel as well. Must. Read. Soon. Thanks for the nudge! Enjoyed reading your review.
Wendy @ The Midnight Garden
I’m so excited about this one! Fantasy has been floating my boat lately and I think I’ll love this one. And thanks to you I have a copy to read :). Should I get and read the novellas first or after?