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A Court of Mist & Fury
Sarah J. Maas
ACOTAR, book two
656 pages, Paperback
Audiobook, 19+ hours
Night Court Edition published April 29, 2025
ISBN 9781639736706
Feyre survived Amarantha's clutches to return to the Spring Court – but at a steep cost. Though she now possesses the powers of the High Fae, her heart remains human, and it can’t forget the terrible deeds she performed to save Tamlin’s people.
Nor has Feyre forgotten her bargain with Rhysand, the mesmerising High Lord of the feared Night Court. As Feyre navigates his dark web of political games and tantalising promises, a greater evil looms – and she might be key to stopping it.
But only if she can step into her growing power, heal her fractured soul and have the courage to shape her own future – and the future of a world cloven in two...
Everyone deserves a second chance. This is Feyre's.
Three months have passed since what went down in A Court of Thorns and Roses, and Feyre is miserable. And yet... Rhysand come get this damn woman. She's being stupid again!
She's haunted by her kills. She has nightmares. She's vomiting at all hours of the night. She's trapped under guard, in a house, losing weight, turning pale, panic driven at the color red... and she's still f#€^£;#% Tamlin!! I know women like this exist but there is not an iota of my being that can relate to this kind of insanity. Feyre is the only person to go from human to Fae and actually have a glow down instead of up.
Part 2 ::
Being in Velaris, at the restaurant, sitting round the table and sharing their history - how they met and the obstacles they'd overcome - was so very reminiscent of the League. It took me back to Nykyrian and yes, Rhysand very much gave Syn vibes, and I had all the feels as this inner circle divulged how Rhys had come to have his Inner Circle: his Second, Morrigan; his Third, Amren; the commander of his armies, Cassien; and his spy, Azriel.
Page after page, chapter after chapter, I was trying my best to like Feyre. I was desperate to see her through Rhysand's eyes and kept reminding myself that she does have redeemable qualities. She is a survivor. When faced with a challenge, she will drag herself up to meet it. What she loves, she will destroy herself to protect. But she's being so *difficult*. The way she thinks. The choices she wrestles with. The mantra she clings to only to forsake.
I was a wolf. I was a wolf. I was a wolf. ...I'm not an animal.
What dafuq?!
And then there's her relationship with Tamlin.
“I had done everything—everything for that love. I had ripped myself to shreds, I had killed innocents and debased myself, and he had sat beside Amarantha on that throne. And he couldn’t do anything, hadn’t risked it—hadn’t risked being caught until there was one night left, and all he’d wanted to do wasn’t free me, but fuck me, and—”
And when Amarantha had broken me, when she had snapped my bones and made my blood boil in its veins, he’d just knelt and begged her. He hadn’t tried to kill her, hadn’t crawled for me. Yes, he’d fought for me—but I’d fought harder for him.
And he had the nerve once his powers were back to shove me into a cage. The nerve to say I was no longer useful; I was to be cloistered for his peace of mind. He’d given me everything I needed to become myself, to feel safe, and when he got what he wanted—when he got his power back, his lands back … he stopped trying. He was still good, still Tamlin, but he was just … wrong.
And then I was sobbing through my clenched teeth, the tears washing away that infected wound, and I didn’t care that Cassian was there, or Rhys or Azriel.
And when Amarantha had broken me, when she had snapped my bones and made my blood boil in its veins, he’d just knelt and begged her. He hadn’t tried to kill her, hadn’t crawled for me. Yes, he’d fought for me—but I’d fought harder for him.
And he had the nerve once his powers were back to shove me into a cage. The nerve to say I was no longer useful; I was to be cloistered for his peace of mind. He’d given me everything I needed to become myself, to feel safe, and when he got what he wanted—when he got his power back, his lands back … he stopped trying. He was still good, still Tamlin, but he was just … wrong.
And then I was sobbing through my clenched teeth, the tears washing away that infected wound, and I didn’t care that Cassian was there, or Rhys or Azriel.
How. Many. Times. Will this woman break apart over this pathetic cretin before enough is enough.
But we press on and in true Maas fashion, after about thirty chapters, we find our stride and all is going swimmingly. A visit to the Summer Court. A side quest with Amren.
And then...
I swore as I slammed into the post of the stairwell landing.You're wrong for that, Maas! I laughed then and I laugh now but you're wrong for that.
Then there came a point, however brief. And I don't know how I got there, but I didn't want this book to end. Maybe it was the spice of 42. Maybe it was the rage of 43. Maybe even the hope found in 44. Maybe it was the culmination of knowing the hell that Rhysand had been suffering for years was reaching its end.
Details got caught up in my consciousness that I would dwell on for hours. The words that he'd said. The questions he'd asked. For Feyre's benefit or his own?
Here was the High Lord of the Night Court with a mate—once in love with the High Lord of Spring—now telling the High Lord of the Summer Court how easy it would be to fall in love with him. Feyre darling, you are lethal to this man's self esteem.
Oh yes, this book was under my skin.
And then finally, finally, it happened: Feyre became the main character I needed her to be. She effortlessly yielded her powers, declared her independence, stood against Lucien (Not Tamlin, but meh), molded her wings and made her choice. Yes, we had faltered a bit when she oh so appallingly told the man who had spent fifty years placating his captor as a whore that all she wanted was fun and a distraction from him... But, fine, push passed, ignore that trigger...We were here.. and then, just.. as.. swiftly...
You bitch.
"...take whatever pieces that you offered"He was willing to take whatever she offered and all I could hear in my head as my eyes flew over the words on the pages was Stop, Feyre. StopitFeyre. Stop. It. Feyre!
"I don't want to hear this."That's what she'd said to him as he poured his heart out. Before she demanded he, poisoned, bloodied, and weak from torture, use whatever power he had left to winnow her home where she left him on his elbows and knees in the mud.
And I just sat there as the chapter closed—raging, tearful, devastated—with a book in my hands too pretty to throw.
Part 3 ::
I don't have the words for Chapter 54 but Feyre is Cauldron blessed that she managed to sort herself out before nightfall. Even if it did take five days for her to face Rhys again. Five days! Just go paint your little pictures, Feyre, it’s not like we’re preparing for a war or anything.
Hasn't that man suffered enough from a volatile female? Feyre... Maas... What are you doing? Why is the lead female continuously lashing out against a far more traumatized leading male? Out to single-handedly exemplify that hurt people hurt people? Using his trust against him. It’s gross.
And from that point I was just ready to be done. No more rollercoaster. No more struggling to love a character hell bent on jumping from victim to villain and back again.
I love this world. I like Lucien and Rhysand and Mor and Azriel and Cassien and Amren. It's Tamlin and these damned humans that keep ruining things. I don’t know if I’ll venture again into the Maasverse. Certainly not anytime soon.
5 out of 5 stars. I can give it no less. This book emotionally wrecked me.
Available in ebook | hardcover | paperback | audiobook
Previously in the series:
One good thing about coming into a series ten years late is that the fanart is abundant and on point!
