Hello lovelies!

Ho-ly crap. Literally, I have no words for this book. Just kidding, I have way too many words, but I am completely blown away.

And the fact that I am so in love with this book is super funny because it took me three weeks of reading about a chapter a day in order for me to actually sink myself into the story, but then I read the last 2/3 of the book in 2 days. And I am fucking in love. So. Much.

Heir of Fire by Sarah J. Maas is the third book in the Throne of Glass series, and I am recently obsessed with this series. The first book that I read by Maas was A Court of Thorns and Roses and you can read that review here. This book made me fall in love with the way that Mass writes, and how she shapes and layers her characters. None of them are flat or boring, and they all seem genuinely real. That is completely true to her first series, Throne of Glass. And they just get better the farther you get into the series.

Now, since this is the third book in the series, I can’t say much about it without spoiling at least a few things about the first two books, Throne of Glass and Crown of Midnight. But I will say that if you have read the first two and you’re struggling to get invested into this book, especially with the introduction of two new main characters, just keep going. I think that my major issue was that I either wanted to focus on just one story line, and it switched at the end of each chapter, or I would come to the POV of a character that I was just. so. done. with. *cough cough Chaol* and I would put the book down, even if I had only read a chapter. But trust me, every character has a good plot line, even if it seems as dull as dry toast *cough cough Chaol* at the beginning.

So that’s all I’m going to say about this book for the people who haven’t read it. So, goodbye people that haven’t read it. Go read it and then come back and we can discuss it!

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS BELOW

Oh. My. God. There is so much going on in this book. It freaking blew my mind. Four plot lines are running all over Adarlan and Wendlyn, and they are all trying to break me into about a million pieces. So, to make this review somewhat easy to follow, I’m going to review one plot line at a time.

Celena: Our beloved assassin. Who is actually Aelin, the rightful queen of Terrasan. What? That was the bomb dropped on us at the end of Crown of Midnight, but I honestly think that most of us saw this coming, or read the last page like cheaters (guilty) do with books that make you this crazy. But, while I saw it coming that she was actually Aelin, who the hell saw her Fae ancestry coming? No one. Literally no one. And despite how much that ripped me a new one, I’ve had time to cope with it, and now I’ve wrapped my mind around her having magic, when, let’s face it, her killing powers were practically magic. And some pretty bad ass magic, at that. And now she’s off in Wendlyn trying to master her magic, and we meet Rowan.

Oh, Rowan. I love him so much. I’m always a sucker for the stoic ones, as well as the goofy and arrogant ones *cough cough Dorian.* But Rowan definitely falls under the former. Plus he’s got tattoos. Oh. I think that tattoos are so sexy, it’s ridiculous. And he’s a seasoned warrior. Oh God, I love him. He reminds me so much of Tamlin from A Court of Thorns and Roses. And the best thing about him is that he doesn’t let Celena bullshit. He doesn’t buy it, and refuses to let anyone else. That makes him infuriating, too, but we love him anyway.

For the first good chunk of their relationship, Rowan and Celena just play the roles of hard-ass instructor and petulant student. And of course Celena is stupid and gets herself into dangerous situations, but now that she’s dealing with magical creatures in a non-magical body, she needs rescuing, and who better than Rowan to be her knight in shining armor? Rowan is the perfect man for her because he understands her power struggle and what it feels like to lose someone, and he is the perfect balance for her.

The thing that makes me mad about their relationship is that it takes Maas so damn long to actually hint at it. When we find out that he is supposed to train her to use her magic, we kinda pick up that it might end in a romantic way, but he’s a total jerk to her for months. I would hate him if I were her. But I’m not. So I love him because I can see what he does in order to get her to use magic. The first time that we are even given the slightest inclination of anything more than friendship between them is when she gives herself over to the fire and almost burns herself out, and he takes her up to his room and they sleep in the same bed and HOLD HANDS WHILE THEY SLEEP. I mean, can I get an awwww? I literally love them. It was at that point in the novel when I officially jumped off my Dorian-Celena ship and climbed aboard the new ship in the harbor for Rowan-Celena. And they just get cuter. He lets his guard down around her, and tells her his heartbreaking story about his mate.

And then. The MAJOR foreshadowing drops. They are talking and Rowan mentions something about how when a male and female mate, you would rather cause physical harm to yourself if it meant you would prevent your mate from being hurt. And Celena thinks about Chaol (I have never been on the Cha-lena ship, but it has to be sunk now). And Rowan tells her that sometimes it takes a physical relationship for the bond to kick into place. Now, to Celena, that just means that she and Chaol, who shared a physical relationship, are NOT mates. But to us believers of Row-ena, it means that even though they spend all this time together, they won’t know that they are actually meant to be together until a sort of physical connection occurs. All in favor of this happening? Amen.

Now they share a blood bond. And the thing that I’m most pissed about is that they can talk to each other in their minds and neither one of the them as made a move. Are you serious? Rowan, you just devoted the rest of your immortal life to her, and you don’t admit that you love her? For reals? Get your ass in gear, boy! Ugh!

Okay, I’m done with them. I’ll just let my impatience fester.

Manon: While I love her now, I was so mad when her first couple of chapters came up. I didn’t want to meet a whole new section of the country, and the witches were people that I honestly couldn’t care less about. No joke, I didn’t care about the witches at all. But then the wyverns came. And I realized how ridiculously cool the witches are. Just think about it. They have metal nails and teeth. That are sharp enough to rip out a jugular. And then they lick the blood of their prey off their nails. Isn’t that absolutely morbidly fascinating?

Honestly, Manon is everything that I wish I was, at least on a confidence and self-worth level. I have always wanted to be absolutely terrifying to enemies, and Manon is. She says to Irska, the heir to another witch coven, that she will “suck the marrow from her bones.” The best part is that she can say that and actually mean it. I do not have a single doubt in my mind that Manon could suck the marrow our of her bones.

Plus, her wyvern is exactly like a puppy. Abraxos is so precious. And we feel so freaking bad for him because he was so abused. I just want to pick him up and take him home.

Like I said, the witches fascinate me, and one thing that I’ve wondered about is their teeth and nails. Manon often talks about retracting her fangs, so does that mean that she was born with these weird iron teeth? I don’t know. Because that seems impossible, and I thought that they replaced the witches real nails with iron ones when they are young, but her talking about her fangs retracting makes me think that they are born with them. What is up with them? The witches are so cool, but they are bat shit crazy, too.

Chaol & Aedion: By the time that I actually binge read this book, this was the only plot line that I got mad when it showed up. Like, Chaol, no one likes you. I think that he is such a baby, and he just mopes and pretends like no one knows that he was in love with the King’s Champion. But in all reality, everyone knows that he’s heartbroken, but surprise, no cares, actually.

And then Aedion returns from war, and his only goal is to annoy Dorian into insanity, and he seems to be under complete control of the king. But then we find out that Aedion is actually part of the conspiracy, but who honestly didn’t see that coming? It was so obvious once we knew that he as sneaking around. Even once the captain was discovered for following him, I thought that there was something fishy about his “complete devotion” to his queen. I honestly don’t buy it, but maybe that is just how Maas is presenting it, because in his last chapter when he is being taken to the dungeon for treason, he thought I wish I could have at least seen her. So that kind of makes me wonder if he really is genuine, but everything else seems forced and faked.

However, I do hope that Aedion gets out, just because I want to see his face when he finds out that Celena/Aelin has already sworn the blood oath with Rowan, because I can imagine him getting super upset, but keeping it together in front of Celena, but after she leaves, or maybe in the middle of the night, he will go after Rowan and try to threaten him or fight him, and make an absolute fool out of himself. How can anyone like Aedion beat a guy like Rowan? The idea is laughable.

Not to mention that Chaol is pissing me off. He is such a baby about everything. At the beginning of this book I already didn’t like Chaol because his chapter finishes Crown of Midnight and he’s such a little bitch about Celena hiding who she actually is, but is like, son she would have been killed by your king if she told you and you would have hated her if you knew. Why is he complaining? And he’s a turd about Dorian’s magic, too. I hate him. Sorry, I hope that he dies in the end of series. Because Cha-lena is totally sunk. It is the Titanic. No discussion.

Dorian: Our favorite prince is off doing absolutely nothing in this book, and it makes me mad because he has so much more potential and drive than that. He can do so many better things than sit in a study with a healer (who is about as exciting and cold tar) and talk about forbidden magic. Now, I understand that he can’t practice magic in the castle, because his father would murder him, but honestly, why does he go looking for a replacement Celena? Sorscha is not as good as Celena, and she’s not as brave either. In fact, I’m actually glad she died. Because no matter how hard I ship Row-ena, there will always be a special place in my heart for Celorian. No matter what. I love them. But I love Row-ena more. Hands down. That’s really all I can say for Dorian. He decided to fill the hole in his heart with a lame version of Celena. Shameful.

***

I hope that you enjoyed my thoughts on this book, and please tell me who you ship, what you thought was awesome, or anything else you want to talk about!

Read the next book, Queen of Shadows with me, along with all of the Throne of Glass novellas in The Assassin’s Blade.

xoxo Aubrey