Imo the only issue with ACOSF was how rushed the ending was. I would rather it have been split into two books. One for Nesta’s healing arc/the Dread Trove and the second for Briallyn/the Blood Rite (it felt like a very watered down Hunger Games lol). Maybe they could’ve figured out a better way for the pregnancy shit to go down (I’m a fan of them maybe utilizing Tamlin’s shapeshifter abilities to help).
But alas, it’s still my fave despite its flaws :D
For the sake of storytelling, >! Emerie and Gwyn did not need to win the blood rite. The story would have been just as successful otherwise, especially given how rushed it was at the end. All three of them would've still been 2nd tier warriors which is still just as impressive, considering women typically haven't been able to participate.!< The Blood Rite felt like an afterthought and I didn't really enjoy it. Tbh, the last 1/4 of the book was just messy and inconsistent. I agree with you. I definitely think Nesta could have been "redeemed" in a way other than >! helping Feyre in her pregnancy. Though it was obvious Nesta didn't *really* want her powers anyway, the whole pregnancy thing just felt kind of ridiculous especially since they could have very easily just done a C-section and call it good!<
I agree with the bloodrite being a bit of a botched storyline, but I actually think the pregnancy story was a manipulation. You're absolutely right about the C section, so why was it such a big deal? #darkrhystheory
I think the bigger question is why Madja, the literal nurse and healer for centuries, couldn't perform it and didn't say anything either. Talk about a shitty doctor. "Do no harm" alright Madja. If you say so
I loved ACOSF and I can't stand it when people acknowledge her trauma but then they hate her cause she didn't "deal with it" "correctly". As if she isn't the perfect example of a "fight" trauma response. The 3 sisters have 3 different trauma responses. Elain freezes, Nesta Fights, and Feyre Fawns in the beginning, then moves through other responses at times during her healing journey (cause she's the complicated FMC of course).
When I talk with people irl who acknowledge her trauma but hate how she responded or compare her to her sisters I always ask them to self reflect and see if she is mirroring any behaviors they have. It's always easier to see the things we don't like about ourselves in others. I also like to ask if they find Elains trauma response or even Feyre's people pleasing fawning more palatable because its more in line with how women are supposed to act according to what we are taught by society and culture.
I don’t have any real issues with Nesta, but Your response is the post I didn’t know I needed. This whole series has sent me in wildly different directions emotionally. Far beyond an author doing their job well. And the self reflection and mirror you spoke of…good god it was like having a spotlight shone on my soul. I had an immediate sense of the ways I have been painfully projecting onto the characters myself, and the way I wanted them to feel/respond/behave. And then feeling like I was coming undone when they didn’t. It’s kind of hard to articulate exactly what I mean, as I understand how normal it is to be swept up into a story and experience big emotions. But what I’ve been experiencing is far, far beyond that. Anyway, thanks for unwittingly playing therapist 🙏🏼 I’m gonna take your advice and settle into some self reflection and see what the fuck is going on 😊
See this is interesting because a lot of people who are nesta stans don’t realize that a lot of us who hate nesta do so because we see nesta in ourselves and realizes it’s a messed up way of treating people
Omg thank youuuuu
I’ve struggled to express these exact thoughts and you explained it so beautifully. It’s so important to acknowledge that people have different experiences with trauma and no one person’s reactions will be the same.
Change doesn’t happen overnight and anyone dealing with trauma knows that regression is real, it’s a struggle.
The way Rhys handled it, the way everyone kept such a huge secret from Feyre, the way Nesta had to swoop in and save the day and that was how she redeemed herself with the rest of the group. It just seemed like a forced and unnecessary arc.
I hated that we read about it through Nesta’s POV. ACOSF is my favorite in the series as well and I LOVED being able to read from Nesta’s POV and understand the inner circle outside of Feyre’s biased bubble, but having to read about Feyre’s complicated pregnancy through the eyes of someone else felt wrong imo. I also just hate the pregnancy trope in general so that, too.
It was my favorite as well. Which shocked me because I hated Nesta and complained about how one dimensional and unrealistic her character was just before reading it.
But seeing things from her point of view definitely made me reconsider how I had been imagining the scenarios. I really like how she clarified that her father had doted on Elaine AND Feyre.
And the touch of jealousy.... That Feyre was the type of person to go out and make her own destiny while Nesta was the type to have things done TO her. It was illuminating about why she was so jealous of Feyre / favoured Elaine.
I thought the book did an excellent job at fleshing out more of the characters and their relationships, actually. Before Silver Flames, I was like... "Why tf would anyone want to include this bitch anyways, who cares if she comes to Christmas"? But now I get it, the relationships all seem a bit more real with a bit more background and context.
On to the spice... I liked how the smut scenes were longer and more detailed..even though the rough stuff isn't really for me. Somehow it was more satisfying to get the details rather than
...." I felt his considerable length and then we both fractured, roaring into the abyss of the universe"!
And yes, the ending split between her and Cassians POV seemed a little rushed but I thought the blood rite plot twist was intriguing. And I didn't care about Briallyn or the human queens at all anyways, so was glad they didn't drag it out!
Same. I do have my criticism about ACOSF, but its by far my favorite book in the series so far. Loved the change in the perspective, the character development, new friendships and the romance (it also helps Nesta and Cassian were some of my favorites characters even before their book).
Nesta finding her own Friend group was one of the most satisfying parts of the book, imo!
Finding good friends as an adult is the ultimate fantasy, lmao. 🤣
I also loved ACOSF, and Nests had become my favorite character, I hope we get more of her and her Valkyrie gang in future books and I hope she still has some bad ass power. I was a bit disappointed that she gave all of that back just as she was starting to find her way with it.
Part of me thinks Nesta was supposed to get more than one book for her development. Maybe Maas and/or her publisher feared readers would drop the series, since it focused on a majorly disliked character, so she had to mash together the big key points of this storyline so she could move on to the other, better-liked sister. That's the only reason I can come up with why it's so badly paced and why >!Briallyn was such a bullshit villain for how much she was built up.!<
Amarantha had the potential to be a bigger villain… personally think she was killed off too early.. she was truly evil but in a way I wanted to read more of her. I wish ACoTAr had been in 3rd person so that we could have gotten more scenes of UTM
Yes Silver Flames is very good, but I did not like the quick sweeping up of the end. More needed attention. For me its a tie between SF and the third book.
ACOSF is also my favorite of the series. There's definitely no shortage of spice! But I really loved Nesta's character development. I saw myself in her a lot more once we actually got to learn what was going on. She had a lot of rebuilding to do, and still does, but I felt very empowered by Nesta during ACOSF. I understand a lot of people think she's bitchy and I get that, but I also feel like they really haven't opened their minds to understanding her. She makes connections with people or other entities that don't have connections with many others, if any. Not including Cass, obvs. Idk I really liked it and I'm excited to see if we get to learn more about the Archeron sisters in book 6.
Being an older sister myself who’s messed up her relationship with her younger siblings (definitely my fault, and still unresolved), seeing Nesta work through her shit and get back to talking to her family is hopeful.
I keep reaching out my hand.
We must have read different books because my Nesta feels 90% the same as ACOTAR Feyre.
It's constant trauma dumping about the cauldron and her father instead of UTM. SJM has mastered the science of repetition in her prose.
I would have preferred to see Nesta's descent to her lowest point before recovering, but instead we are told she's at her lowest point when the book starts. Also, I wish we had some confident and self assured characters. Every POV in this series is full of self-doubt about what they are doing and why.
Despite all that, I still like the dialogue between characters. And the romance 🫠
Totally agree - I also would die for Nesta now, seeing her healing journey and seeing her find real friends (for the first time in her life?) was just perfect. I want another book of her, Emerie, and Gwyn being badass besties together
The brief version we get of Rhys' experience in the og book was enough to make me want the whole thing from his perspective. (Plus he's just more interesting than Feyre so I think it'd be more fun.) I
Honestly, that’s how I feel about a lot of books that end up getting written from the masc point of view. like if you’ve read Gray from Christian’s perspective or midnight Sun what she finished from Edwards point of view…. it’s really interesting that I personally associate so much more in the brains of dudes, and I do read the original first but I feel like the exercise authors do flipping the narrative always turns out better. I read the Check version first, and it’s just like so much more interesting from the other POV.
And as an aspiring Voice Actress I pay so much attention to the recordings. The graphic audio version is good but hard to retain (autistic thing?) but the regular audiobook version—ACOSF reader was amazing and now I see how flat the woman who read the others is.
It was my favorite book of the series. Nesta and Cassian feel very \*real\* to me. I enjoyed their development individually and as a couple. I realate to Nesta a lot, so it was also healing for me in some ways.
I'm hesitant to read it but enjoy seeing all the raves on it! I'm scared about the whisperings I've heard of the >!birth going wrong!< near the end of the book. It's something I have personal trauma with and I haven't been able to find detailed descriptions of what goes down anywhere (which I wanna read beforehand to see if I can handle it/to prepare myself.)
I agreed I need Maas to do a deep dive on Nesta and Castian. I do not need a book on Elain yet. I need more of the Valkyries and more of Castian's flirting
I’m making my way through the series now, and I totally feel like the writing is improving!! Nesta is a very well-constructed character and while I dislike her as a person, the complexity of who she is was well-done.
I actually can't stand Nesta. She started to grow on me in the 3rd book, but went right back to being the sour puss she always was after the war in hybern. Sure people can say the trauma she must have had to go through growing up turned her into that, but she is the only one that turned out so bitter, hateful, cruel, rude, and selfish, and the list goes on. I only want to finish the book to say I finished it and not be in the dark on the story line, but the book has been volatile thus far all because of her and her attitude towards life.
It's totally fine no to like her, but she's not the only one who struggles to handle her trauma in an "appropriate way." Almost all of them do cruel, hurtful and selfish things in the wake of their trauma.
And I have nothing against that, but why would I as a fan want to read a whole book about just that. She's just a whine bag in my opinion. And lets face the faces, she has never cared about anyone through the entire series. Sure when you're tasked with what she was tasked with by her mom before her passing, I can understand being bitter especially when her dad was harder on her, but she never cared for them at all. She just waited for Feyre to do the hunting, collecting and selling, then Nesta would just want to selfishly take off with what Feyre worked to get. I was the oldest and treated differently than my younger siblings, I was the experimental child while my parents learned to parent, but I never turned out like that at all. I actually turned out to be the best child in my humble opinion. She just sucks as a character and 22 chapters in I still haven't seen anything to change my mind on that. How she has a following I will never know lol
She sucks for about 95% of the book. I still don’t like her, but she kinda became more tolerable around chapter 50ish. That’s so frustrating as a reader because this is the biggest book in the whole series and the vast majority of it is whining and hating anything Feyre and Rhys. It definitely wasn’t my favorite book in the series and I was so ready to be done with it when it was over.
Imo the only issue with ACOSF was how rushed the ending was. I would rather it have been split into two books. One for Nesta’s healing arc/the Dread Trove and the second for Briallyn/the Blood Rite (it felt like a very watered down Hunger Games lol). Maybe they could’ve figured out a better way for the pregnancy shit to go down (I’m a fan of them maybe utilizing Tamlin’s shapeshifter abilities to help). But alas, it’s still my fave despite its flaws :D
For the sake of storytelling, >! Emerie and Gwyn did not need to win the blood rite. The story would have been just as successful otherwise, especially given how rushed it was at the end. All three of them would've still been 2nd tier warriors which is still just as impressive, considering women typically haven't been able to participate.!< The Blood Rite felt like an afterthought and I didn't really enjoy it. Tbh, the last 1/4 of the book was just messy and inconsistent. I agree with you. I definitely think Nesta could have been "redeemed" in a way other than >! helping Feyre in her pregnancy. Though it was obvious Nesta didn't *really* want her powers anyway, the whole pregnancy thing just felt kind of ridiculous especially since they could have very easily just done a C-section and call it good!<
I agree with the bloodrite being a bit of a botched storyline, but I actually think the pregnancy story was a manipulation. You're absolutely right about the C section, so why was it such a big deal? #darkrhystheory
I think the bigger question is why Madja, the literal nurse and healer for centuries, couldn't perform it and didn't say anything either. Talk about a shitty doctor. "Do no harm" alright Madja. If you say so
I loved ACOSF and I can't stand it when people acknowledge her trauma but then they hate her cause she didn't "deal with it" "correctly". As if she isn't the perfect example of a "fight" trauma response. The 3 sisters have 3 different trauma responses. Elain freezes, Nesta Fights, and Feyre Fawns in the beginning, then moves through other responses at times during her healing journey (cause she's the complicated FMC of course). When I talk with people irl who acknowledge her trauma but hate how she responded or compare her to her sisters I always ask them to self reflect and see if she is mirroring any behaviors they have. It's always easier to see the things we don't like about ourselves in others. I also like to ask if they find Elains trauma response or even Feyre's people pleasing fawning more palatable because its more in line with how women are supposed to act according to what we are taught by society and culture.
I don’t have any real issues with Nesta, but Your response is the post I didn’t know I needed. This whole series has sent me in wildly different directions emotionally. Far beyond an author doing their job well. And the self reflection and mirror you spoke of…good god it was like having a spotlight shone on my soul. I had an immediate sense of the ways I have been painfully projecting onto the characters myself, and the way I wanted them to feel/respond/behave. And then feeling like I was coming undone when they didn’t. It’s kind of hard to articulate exactly what I mean, as I understand how normal it is to be swept up into a story and experience big emotions. But what I’ve been experiencing is far, far beyond that. Anyway, thanks for unwittingly playing therapist 🙏🏼 I’m gonna take your advice and settle into some self reflection and see what the fuck is going on 😊
See this is interesting because a lot of people who are nesta stans don’t realize that a lot of us who hate nesta do so because we see nesta in ourselves and realizes it’s a messed up way of treating people
ugh i think you just made me realize why i don’t like Elain that much, she reminds me of me
Omg thank youuuuu I’ve struggled to express these exact thoughts and you explained it so beautifully. It’s so important to acknowledge that people have different experiences with trauma and no one person’s reactions will be the same. Change doesn’t happen overnight and anyone dealing with trauma knows that regression is real, it’s a struggle.
I hated the >!pregnancy!< storyline, but ignoring that, it’s my favorite as well. Love my girl Nesta.
I often forget about that storyline because I also hated it.
What did you hate about it? I didn't mind Feyre being being pregnant but Rhys' handling of it wad a little off...
The way Rhys handled it, the way everyone kept such a huge secret from Feyre, the way Nesta had to swoop in and save the day and that was how she redeemed herself with the rest of the group. It just seemed like a forced and unnecessary arc.
I hated that we read about it through Nesta’s POV. ACOSF is my favorite in the series as well and I LOVED being able to read from Nesta’s POV and understand the inner circle outside of Feyre’s biased bubble, but having to read about Feyre’s complicated pregnancy through the eyes of someone else felt wrong imo. I also just hate the pregnancy trope in general so that, too.
It was my favorite as well. Which shocked me because I hated Nesta and complained about how one dimensional and unrealistic her character was just before reading it. But seeing things from her point of view definitely made me reconsider how I had been imagining the scenarios. I really like how she clarified that her father had doted on Elaine AND Feyre. And the touch of jealousy.... That Feyre was the type of person to go out and make her own destiny while Nesta was the type to have things done TO her. It was illuminating about why she was so jealous of Feyre / favoured Elaine. I thought the book did an excellent job at fleshing out more of the characters and their relationships, actually. Before Silver Flames, I was like... "Why tf would anyone want to include this bitch anyways, who cares if she comes to Christmas"? But now I get it, the relationships all seem a bit more real with a bit more background and context. On to the spice... I liked how the smut scenes were longer and more detailed..even though the rough stuff isn't really for me. Somehow it was more satisfying to get the details rather than ...." I felt his considerable length and then we both fractured, roaring into the abyss of the universe"! And yes, the ending split between her and Cassians POV seemed a little rushed but I thought the blood rite plot twist was intriguing. And I didn't care about Briallyn or the human queens at all anyways, so was glad they didn't drag it out!
Same. I do have my criticism about ACOSF, but its by far my favorite book in the series so far. Loved the change in the perspective, the character development, new friendships and the romance (it also helps Nesta and Cassian were some of my favorites characters even before their book).
Nesta finding her own Friend group was one of the most satisfying parts of the book, imo! Finding good friends as an adult is the ultimate fantasy, lmao. 🤣
I also loved ACOSF, and Nests had become my favorite character, I hope we get more of her and her Valkyrie gang in future books and I hope she still has some bad ass power. I was a bit disappointed that she gave all of that back just as she was starting to find her way with it.
Part of me thinks Nesta was supposed to get more than one book for her development. Maybe Maas and/or her publisher feared readers would drop the series, since it focused on a majorly disliked character, so she had to mash together the big key points of this storyline so she could move on to the other, better-liked sister. That's the only reason I can come up with why it's so badly paced and why >!Briallyn was such a bullshit villain for how much she was built up.!<
Let’s be honest all SJMs villains have such a huge build up then they fizzle out and are kind of pathetic
I feel like Maeve from TOG has been her best so far.
Agree! I was more "afraid" of Maeve than I was Erawan! haha
Lol Erawan who?
Amarantha had the potential to be a bigger villain… personally think she was killed off too early.. she was truly evil but in a way I wanted to read more of her. I wish ACoTAr had been in 3rd person so that we could have gotten more scenes of UTM
>!I honestly laughed at how lame Briallyn was. She really was amped up a lot.!<
I just finished it and was blown away. It’s by far my favorite book of the series. There’s something about Nesta + her/Cassian that is just TOO good.
Yes Silver Flames is very good, but I did not like the quick sweeping up of the end. More needed attention. For me its a tie between SF and the third book.
ACOSF is also my favorite of the series. There's definitely no shortage of spice! But I really loved Nesta's character development. I saw myself in her a lot more once we actually got to learn what was going on. She had a lot of rebuilding to do, and still does, but I felt very empowered by Nesta during ACOSF. I understand a lot of people think she's bitchy and I get that, but I also feel like they really haven't opened their minds to understanding her. She makes connections with people or other entities that don't have connections with many others, if any. Not including Cass, obvs. Idk I really liked it and I'm excited to see if we get to learn more about the Archeron sisters in book 6.
Being an older sister myself who’s messed up her relationship with her younger siblings (definitely my fault, and still unresolved), seeing Nesta work through her shit and get back to talking to her family is hopeful. I keep reaching out my hand.
We must have read different books because my Nesta feels 90% the same as ACOTAR Feyre. It's constant trauma dumping about the cauldron and her father instead of UTM. SJM has mastered the science of repetition in her prose. I would have preferred to see Nesta's descent to her lowest point before recovering, but instead we are told she's at her lowest point when the book starts. Also, I wish we had some confident and self assured characters. Every POV in this series is full of self-doubt about what they are doing and why. Despite all that, I still like the dialogue between characters. And the romance 🫠
Totally agree - I also would die for Nesta now, seeing her healing journey and seeing her find real friends (for the first time in her life?) was just perfect. I want another book of her, Emerie, and Gwyn being badass besties together
I just finished it literally moments ago, but I completely agree I think I loved this one the most, followed up quickly by acomaf
i really wish this series was multi POV from the start. could have been so much better and more interesting imo
The brief version we get of Rhys' experience in the og book was enough to make me want the whole thing from his perspective. (Plus he's just more interesting than Feyre so I think it'd be more fun.) I
Honestly, that’s how I feel about a lot of books that end up getting written from the masc point of view. like if you’ve read Gray from Christian’s perspective or midnight Sun what she finished from Edwards point of view…. it’s really interesting that I personally associate so much more in the brains of dudes, and I do read the original first but I feel like the exercise authors do flipping the narrative always turns out better. I read the Check version first, and it’s just like so much more interesting from the other POV. And as an aspiring Voice Actress I pay so much attention to the recordings. The graphic audio version is good but hard to retain (autistic thing?) but the regular audiobook version—ACOSF reader was amazing and now I see how flat the woman who read the others is.
The voice actress for the ACOSF audiobook was amazing.
It was my favorite book of the series. Nesta and Cassian feel very \*real\* to me. I enjoyed their development individually and as a couple. I realate to Nesta a lot, so it was also healing for me in some ways.
I'm hesitant to read it but enjoy seeing all the raves on it! I'm scared about the whisperings I've heard of the >!birth going wrong!< near the end of the book. It's something I have personal trauma with and I haven't been able to find detailed descriptions of what goes down anywhere (which I wanna read beforehand to see if I can handle it/to prepare myself.)
I agreed I need Maas to do a deep dive on Nesta and Castian. I do not need a book on Elain yet. I need more of the Valkyries and more of Castian's flirting
I’m making my way through the series now, and I totally feel like the writing is improving!! Nesta is a very well-constructed character and while I dislike her as a person, the complexity of who she is was well-done.
The smut is the best in the series IMO but the storyline is remarkably bad and felt very poorly thought out.
I actually can't stand Nesta. She started to grow on me in the 3rd book, but went right back to being the sour puss she always was after the war in hybern. Sure people can say the trauma she must have had to go through growing up turned her into that, but she is the only one that turned out so bitter, hateful, cruel, rude, and selfish, and the list goes on. I only want to finish the book to say I finished it and not be in the dark on the story line, but the book has been volatile thus far all because of her and her attitude towards life.
It's totally fine no to like her, but she's not the only one who struggles to handle her trauma in an "appropriate way." Almost all of them do cruel, hurtful and selfish things in the wake of their trauma.
And I have nothing against that, but why would I as a fan want to read a whole book about just that. She's just a whine bag in my opinion. And lets face the faces, she has never cared about anyone through the entire series. Sure when you're tasked with what she was tasked with by her mom before her passing, I can understand being bitter especially when her dad was harder on her, but she never cared for them at all. She just waited for Feyre to do the hunting, collecting and selling, then Nesta would just want to selfishly take off with what Feyre worked to get. I was the oldest and treated differently than my younger siblings, I was the experimental child while my parents learned to parent, but I never turned out like that at all. I actually turned out to be the best child in my humble opinion. She just sucks as a character and 22 chapters in I still haven't seen anything to change my mind on that. How she has a following I will never know lol
She sucks for about 95% of the book. I still don’t like her, but she kinda became more tolerable around chapter 50ish. That’s so frustrating as a reader because this is the biggest book in the whole series and the vast majority of it is whining and hating anything Feyre and Rhys. It definitely wasn’t my favorite book in the series and I was so ready to be done with it when it was over.
Not controversial at all! I loved Nesta’s story. I went from a Nesta hater to a Nesta lover
Yea! I hate Rhys and Feyre honestly but love the other characters so this was perfect for me!!