Despite taking a very long time to read this book, I still feel that the four stars are very well deserved. I found that my biggest issue was that although these novellas all flow together well enough to be just one large story, that I had to view them all as separate stories that could be read on their own. I will elaborate more on that at the end of this review, after I break this down by each novella.

The Assassin and the Pirate Lord : 5/5 stars.
I thought this novella was honestly a lot of fun. We finally get to see Celaena in action, and more than that we finally get to see her doing something that she wants to do, rather than acting as a puppet and following orders

Spoiler

(or pretending to follow orders but I think you get the point)

. This was a fun and fast-paced novella that shows us a more human and likable side to our favorite assassin. I liked finally meeting Sam, and I liked even more that despite the fact that I fell into insta-love with him, Celaena does not appear to do so. I read this novella a few months ago (it really took me a while to get through this compilation ok) so while I don’t remember the full plot, I do remember the key points to this and all I can say without giving too much away is that this one is definitely worth reading. Lots of great characterization, and a simple plot that provides really important clues as to what is important later on in Celaena’s story.
The Assassin and the Healer : 5/5 stars.
I seem to be in the minority here but this one was absolutely my favorite!!! We get full on bad-ass Celaena full of revenge and DOING SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Shes fierce, shes unforgiving, and she is literally everything I wanted her to be in Throne of Glass. Most of my complaints about this series as whole is that Maas does a lot of tell and not enough show in terms of giving us this bad ass MC, but this novella is lots of show and tell and I’m ALL ABOUT IT. Plus we still get to see the human, compassionate side of Celaena that we got to see bits of in The Assassin and the Pirate Lord. For me this novella had the perfect amount of balance in showing and telling us about the character, and also in showing us the different sides of her. Plus it was just a super quick read with a really sweet story line to make it even easier to get through!
The Assassin and the Desert : 4/5 stars.
This was the first novella that was just a little too long for my tastes. I was anticipating this story the most, and was relatively disappointed by it. This story is crucial to Celaena’s character development throughout the story, both physically and mentally, considering that her time with the silent assassins in the desert is frequently mentioned in the next novellas as well as the rest of the series. And yet so much of this novella is focused on Celaena pre-development. I think I would have preferred to spend more time in this story while or after the events of it to see how Celaena processes everything, but instead it feels like we watch it from the outside and then are told how Celaena feels about it, and kind of left to fill in the blanks ourselves.
A lot of this novella focuses on Celaena dealing with her personal discomfort in her current situation. And this is literally countered by characters who are surprised that the notorious Celaena Sardothian is so whiney, and honestly I feel a stronger connection to the other characters in this one. ESPECIALLY after finally watching her be a TOTAL BOSS in the first two novellas. It just fell a bit short for me. I understand why she was uncomfortable and I understand that she has a difficult past but I think the focus in this was a little off, at least from what I was hoping for.
The Assassin and the Underworld : 4/5 stars
Okay this was honestly my least favorite. First of all this took me almost an entire month to read. Second of all it was annoying and manipulative and despite eventually allowing Celaena to be a boss, also highlights her vulnerability to mistakes. And don’t get me wrong, I can appreciate a soft side to a bad ass character, but this just all felt so forced/convenient at the same time. I don’t know I guess I just didn’t buy it.
Basically this novella starts off with us seeing the super materialistic and spoiled side of Celaena once again. And it ends with her realizing that she has been lied to and manipulated, which leaves readers wonder when else has she been manipulated and lied to but she doesn’t really think about it like that so it’s kind of weird. The only good thing to come out of this novella is an awareness to readers that despite Celaena’s hard exterior, she trusts people a little too much even when they do her dirty. And also lots of Sam x Celaena feels, like wow.
This one is really important to help us understand Celaena but the delivery wasn’t really my cup of tea.
The Assassin and the Empire : 5/5 stars
This novella made me equal parts sad and angry. I’ll skip the plot here because I didn’t go into much plot while discussing the other novellas. So, Sad because the MC who throughout the novellas we see play the roll of total bad ass, as well as a conflicted and materialistic girl, ends up pretty broken. We see so many sides of Celaena in these stories that it was really difficult to read about her being in such a bad place. Obviously, readers know that this would be where she ends up based on the events in the other books but it was still so heart breaking to actually read the events and the reasoning that resulted in her getting to that place
And ANGRY FOR REASONS I REALLY CANT SAY BECAUSE SPOILERS BUT basically everything about this novella that makes me sad also makes me angry when we see the entire picture laid out like this.


Overview: Each novella on its own has really great qualities. For me I think I would have done better if I spread out reading these a bit more, and was more conscious of the fact that even though this was a compilation that flow together nicely, that these are five separate stories. I found myself frustrated at the beginning of most of these novellas because the beginnings are all so similar in that they introduce the same character and we see the same flaws constantly portrayed despite the fact that in the previous novella she seems to go through things that should result in character growth. But when you view these as five separate stories, it makes more sense that we would revisit things from the past since character growth is a constant improvement type of thing. I definitely feel it is just my own personal preference, and the fact that I read this like a normal book and was therefore annoyed by the repetitive nature.
I also think that if/when I reread this series that I will read this before reading Throne of Glass. I think that once everything is laid out on the table about our MC, these novellas work better BUT I also think that they just make the most sense to read before ToG. I honestly wonder if my enjoyment level for the entire series/even just this book, would have been different if I read this as a different point in the series? I’ll definitely have to address that if I ever reread!