Book Review: House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J. Maas

Hello everyone and happy April! It has literally reached 80 degrees where I was yesterday, which is absolutely criminal for the beginning of spring. It’s also spring allergy season, which I am not here for.

It’s been a long time since I wrote my last post, but I’m excited to be sharing my thoughts on House of Sky and Breath with you all today. And…I unfortunately have to say that I am not with the hype this time. Listen, I have had the absolute LONGEST love/hate relationship with SJM’s books and I have crazy mixed opinions of her series. Lately, I have been on a streak of not really enjoying her books as much with ACOFAS and ACOSF, and this is low-key going to continue that trend. I will still come back crawling for more despite it though.

I believe this review will be on the shorter side, but hopefully it will be enjoyable despite that. I usually elaborate a bit on reviews, but I read this one a while back and forgot to post it on here, so I don’t actually remember too many details on the book.

Anyways, this book was not terrible (hence the three star rating), so there were some pros with it!

The Saving Graces of this Book:

1. Ruhn! Everyone saying that Bryce and Hunt are the best…respectfully no. He was my favorite in Crescent City 1, and he’s my favorite in Crescent City 2 as well. The forbidden love trope is one of my favorites and the whole mystery of finding out who Agent Daybright was honestly kept me reading this 800 PAGE book. The reveal surprised me a lot honestly, but I’m also an incredibly oblivious reader so take that as you will.
2. The whole plot was pretty fun despite being disgustingly long (which I will go over later). I was incredibly confused for the entire first half of the book because I remembered absolutely nothing from Crescent City 1, but after I got through that I was pretty invested! All the political dynamics were very interesting, and I loved seeing how these different complex groups interacted with each other.

Now, we got all the other stuff that I did not like!

Everything I Disliked Because I Have to Rant Somewhere: 

1. This book was SO LONG. Like oh my lord this book could have been cut down halfway and you would not have lost out on anything. There are parts that are so slow paced and it ruins the strong plot because it takes 27 years to get there. Like you don’t have to make the book 800 pages? It’s still over double the length of books I usually read! It was truly a test of patience.
2. Bryce. I already know that this is going to be a crazy unpopular opinion, but i thought she was so annoying. She acts selfishly and disguises it by being like “omg noooo i did it for you! you can’t POSSIBLY be mad at me right??” She’s inconsiderate and doesn’t possibly consider what the people around her, that she cares for, thinks if it doesn’t align with what she wants. She also endangers the lives of others around her so so recklessly. 
3. Bryce and Hunt’s romance. I am literally a romance person who reads romance in my spare time, but I did not like this one at all. There’s a whole winter solstice thing that SJM tries to use to build up sexual tension, but it just felt so forced. I don’t know, something about the romance as a whole rubbed me the wrong way.
4. Tharion. This man begged to marry the sea queen’s daughter and is upset he actually has to do it now? He’s been dragging her on for years. They go to this party too and she’s so excited to be there and he’s standing there the whole time clearly not even making an effort to pretend like he’s not suffering. It cannot be hard. Get this poor girl someone who actually cares for her. 

I will say that I am kind of obsessed with that ending. It was so wild. I did not think we would ever get anything like that, and I desperately need to see where it goes. I know it’s definitely going to be a hit or miss for everyone that reads, but fortunately I was in the group that did appreciate it.

Anyways, that concludes my review. I hope you all enjoyed reading through my thoughts! I went on a huge 1-2 month break not reading, but I’m finally starting to get back into it. I finished Aurora’s End recently because of a friend’s recommendation, which was really good. I honestly didn’t have much of an intention of finishing the series despite loving the first two books, but I’m glad that I did now. I’m currently in the process of starting Wheel of Time, and it takes sooo much energy reading it, but I’m enjoying it a lot so far.

Hope you all have a fantastic Tuesday and rest of the week!
-Allison