“Stars flickered around us, sweet darkness sweeping in. As if we were the only souls in a galaxy.”

Edit: After discussion with other ACOTAR fans, I realize I didn't actually like this novella all that much. Most of the opinions below still stand, but there are more issues that I have with the book than what is mentioned below.

Stars (Out of 10): 9.5/10 Stars

Favorite Character: Azriel

Spoiler Free: Picking up a new Maas book has started to feel like slipping back into my favorite pair of pajamas. It’s a comfy sort of feeling, a feeling of coming back home, being surrounded by familiar faces and places. ACOFAS has been no different.

While ACOFAS was different in the sense that it was a novella, and therefore really only introduced things that were detrimental for later books instead of actually solving any large problems, it still carried the same feel of the series that I’ve known and loved the past few years. And while it was super short (though longer than a normal novella), and I did feel like it was over way too fast, it was still just enough to hold me over until the next book, as well as get me excited for the continuation of the series again. Seeing an ending to the main trilogy in ACOWAR had somehow dulled the excitement for what comes after, leading my love to become more muted.

As I said above, this novella could have been considered an extended prologue for the next book, setting the scene for how the following books would come to fruition. In a sense, it also served as an extended epilogue to ACOWAR, both reinforcing its ending as well as revealing more hidden behind the ending, showing how the characters are left, broken and scarred, after the war. (It took quite a toll, and I love how real the characters felt due to it.)

There wasn’t much more to this novella, but overall I just want to say that I’m mostly happy with the direction Maas chose to go with both this novella and the rest of the story so far, as this book didn’t sugarcoat anything while still giving us cute and funny moments.

Careful! Spoilers beyond this point!

Spoilers:

Spoiler

Here, I’m just going to talk about the small things that bugged me (either at the time of occurring, or now after having finished.)

Firstly, Rhys’s first interaction with Tamlin really bugged me when I read it at first. This was not the Rhys we had grown to know and love, but rather the image he had taken to protect his court, that of someone spiteful and evil. However, this annoyance died down quickly, as this issue, and his actions towards Tamlin then, were discussed with many characters throughout the book.

However, I did like that Lucien brought up what Feyre did to the Spring Court. Yes I was cheering her on at the time, and yes she is totally free to do what she wants, especially in terms of revenge, and I personally feel she was just speeding up things that probably would have happened anyways, there is still the matter of the disastrous aftermath. An entire court is weakened and displaced within the power structure of Prythian. There are going to be problems with this, and things that Feyre/Rhys will have to do to make amends for the people that were wrongly hurt in those actions. And I love how this was not forgotten.

Lastly, I was angry with the path Maas is following in terms of Nesta. While the excerpt of the next book does change these feelings, as I am happy with how that seems to be going, I found myself constantly frustrated with Nesta and the entire situation. I want to love her strength and ferocity, but every since book 1, I have been unable to let go of my frustration with her selfishness in some situations. This never went away from first having met her as the sister who wasted Feyre’s hard-earned money. While Feyre is ready to reconcile, and put lots of work towards that throughout the entire series, I’ve never seen Nesta return the favor. And while I understand that her situation is horrendous, and she never asked for any of this, it still hurts me. That’s why ACOFAS killed me a little in that regard. When it came to ACOWAR, I thought we were starting to see positive change. Nesta was working towards victory with them, and seemed to be working towards a better relationship with Feyre again. However, ACOFAS completely went against that, and while I understand the events were extremely traumatic (and even that is an understatement), it seems so weird for Nesta to entirely shut everyone out, even Elain. It is the shutting out of Elain that actually hurts me most here. But the final excerpt gives me hope for reconciliation in the near future (as that is one of my main remaining wishes from the series.)