Reviews with content warning for Death of parent - Kingdom of Ash

This book never fails to leave an ache in my chest when I finish it. The characters and world are so well written. It makes me wish I could go back and start it all over again for the first time.

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angelofthetardis's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The grand finale of the 'Throne of Glass' series, this almost 1,000 page tome promises the deepening of bonds, the severing of others and the climax of a seemingly unwinnable battle. The question of who will live and who will die are on the reader's mind from the outset, and by this point you are so invested in the series that it feels like you're right there in the thick of things with the characters.

Having made it through the previous books, you will now be familiar with all of the characters and their backgrounds, unless you have a terrible memory and have to rely on the library delivering the books to you, like me. In which case, there are a LOT of different story threads you now have to follow, each of them vital to the plot in their own way. For the vast majority of the book, the perspective shifts between at least four different spheres of action, and each chapter takes you to a different thread. Given how short the author's chapters generally are, you would be forgiven for getting into a spin trying to keep everything straight! It's not hard to do, but to me it does make the book feel rather choppy - I'm not sure if another tandem read situation followed by a smaller finale book when everyone comes together might have been a better way to go. That way, you could have the choice of taking it all in in one go, or choosing to focus on one or two threads at a time.

I do think a lot of my opinions rest on the fact that I haven't been able to binge-read this series (see library comment above); I'm hoping that I will get more out of it when I finally get around to buying the series and reading it straight through. But right now, I feel like I should be more affected by the Valg, Maeve and the other darker aspects of this book than I am. I can't say I've ever found the Valg part of the storyline that straightforward to follow, but now I'm at the end I found their ultimate story arc to be quite lacklustre. Likewise, I didn't see the need to add another layer to the 'Wicked Queen' storyline; I actually found Maeve worse when she was supposed to be just Fae! Ultimately, although there are dark moments, Aelin's fire shines too brightly to give them any real depth or impact for me.

SJM is a queen of worldbuilding; she has an amazing ability to paint vivid and ridiculously detailed images with her words. While in broad terms this series is no exception, by the time I reached 'Kingdom of Ash' a part of me was thinking that she's almost gone into too much detail, which means I now have a less clear picture in my mind because I've got too much to consider.

I've come to love all of the main characters and their personalities; some are so easy to picture (I'm sorry, but I can only see Tom Hiddleston with his 'Loki' attitude playing Lorcan!) Their personal journeys are so well thought out and executed, it really is a pleasure to watch them mature and adapt. However, in this book it was really only the fate of the various romantic entanglements that gave me any sort of visceral reaction; the need for the right people to end up together became more important to me than the outcome of the war. I feel like a significant shock was needed to properly tear out your heart, but nothing ever really materialised. There is character death, yes, but for once in my life I am slightly disappointed that there wasn't more... I don't want any of them to die, but I just think the story was crying our for it to turn it from good to great. It's also in dire need of an epilogue!!! I need a 'One Year Later' (or similar) update!!!

The series overall is very enjoyable and a great read, but ultimately it does feel like the dress rehearsal for ACOTAR, which I do still prefer. But I'm hopeful we haven't heard the last of Aelin, Rowan and their Court... keeping everything crossed!!!

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toastyghosty13's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

this book started off very strong off the heels of a cliffhanger from one of the previous books. i loved seeing all of the characters grow into their roles and becoming more mature.

i do think there are an immense number of loose ends that i don’t feel were tied up properly by the end. so many characters that were mentioned in previous books, and plot lines/details of characters that were never elaborated on only to be treated as if they had never existed. i know this is SJMs first major series and how she got into writing professionally, but 8 books deep and i’m kind of disappointed with how rushed and thrown together the ending felt.

Spoiler

i hope that there might be a continuation of the plot lines and characters i mentioned in other SJM works, since there is clearly that multiverse mention with ACOTAR. SJM does have a tendency to pull out old forgotten details to become a plot twist in her books.

despite all of this, i still really enjoyed the series as a whole and will absolutely reread in the future.

edit: changing my rating from 3.5 to 3 after thinking it through more. also here are the exact loose ends i had in mind and vaguely mentioned above

WARNING HEAVY SPOILERS

Spoiler

elide has witch blood, but then how do we know she isn’t immortal? her witch blood was mentioned once and never really brought up again. this could have helped with lorcans fear of her growing old while he stays young, besides binding his life to hers like he canonically does. this would also give elide a connection to the witches now rebuilding their kingdom in the wastes at the end of all of this, since she could help and still maintain a regular cadence with some of the friends she made there
dorian’s mother and brother never being heard of after initial mention
same with chaols mother and brother for the most part. at least we got some closure about them wanting to live with chaol & yrene and reconnect but it would have been cool to see more of them and his father too
i also wished we would have had literally anything with aelin in eyllwe like meeting nehemias family especially when they were so close around the time they found the mirror in empire of storm. she was very close with nehemia and i’m shocked there was no mention of them or trying to get more support from them for the war
it would have been cool to see more about the gods, they’re very mysterious the entire time yet are pivotal in how everything happens. how did the gods get here in the first place? are there more of them? also why do they suck so much? you would think they would actually try to help aelin with bringing them back to their own world, they really made everything more difficult for aelin & crew after their ”special quest” was the main plot pusher the entire time
same goes a bit for the valg, mainly with what are erawans brothers up to right now. while reading queen of shadows i would have bet money that they would have come through a portal for an epic showdown with aelin.
who is the owl at maeve’s side? was it silba? why bother mentioning it at all if it’s never brought up again. i really thought that would play a pivotal point in the war and being an ally
what happened to cressida blueblood? she ran off after facing manon but wasn’t mentioned again, unlike the blackbeak matron who was killed in a main battle by asterin when the thirteen sacrificed themselves
aelin losing her powers for literally no reason at all, the gods suck and if anything i feel like this loss made the final showdown against maeve/erawan kinda lame
aelin might have seen a certain main man from ACOTAR while falling through worlds; i haven’t seen any mention of this in the ACOTAR books though. will that also conveniently be forgotten?
sol, ravi, galan, ansel, ilias, and other characters that came to aid in the war; sjm really didn’t go into detail about them and i want to know more backstory about who they are and why i should care about them. ansel and ilias should have had some sort of catch-up scene that shows what they’ve been doing the last 2 years since aelin last saw them in the assassins blade prequel events.
vaughn, who is apart of the group of warriors that took the blood oath of maeve. i think he’s been mentioned twice throughout the series. why bother even mentioning him when it’s just another character to keep track of that yields nothing to the plot despite heavily implying that he could be important?
rolfe and the mycenians. they come through big time and save aedion and lysandras butts. they are supposed to be this wondrous mythical group of people from the sea, yet they are barely talked about despite being the main reason there are any survivors in aedions legion to go protect terassen after perranth falls.
the whitethorn squad that turns on maeve. we meet their characters initially but they are also barely mentioned again. would have been nice to see anything of the whitethorn family dynamic.

i really wanted to like this book more than i did. i don’t think it did the series justice as the way to tie it all together in the end. imo, about half of the books that came before it had much more pickup and more interesting plot points, so this felt like it faltered in the greatness it was set up for.

the first half of kingdom of ash felt like there was a lot of build up of traveling and dwindling forces on the terassen front all for a (imo) lackluster payoff of what it could have been.

this should have been 2-3 more books, with 2 of them being tandem like how empire of storm and tower of dawn are. the 2 tandem could have been one POV from where aedion and lysandra are and how they are managing with perranth/terassen, while the other could have been rowan/lorcan/elide/fenrys/aelin and their adventure and battles. then a 3rd and final book to actually tie it all together once both sides of the tandem have truly met up, since they didn’t even meet up until the last ~90 pages of kingdom of ash anyways.

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gibbse97's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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tagau's review against another edition

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adventurous dark hopeful fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Sarah J. Maas's "Kingdom of Ash" was a thrilling conclusion to her "Throne of Glass" series. From the very first page, I was drawn into a world of magic and falling in love with the complex characters that are both relatable and larger than life. In this final book, she brings all of her beloved characters together for a final battle against the forces of evil.

Maas keeps the tension high, with unexpected twists and turns that kept me on the edge of my seat.There were moments of heartbreak and despair, as well as moments of triumph and hope. Through it all, Maas never lost sight of the emotional core of her story. Each character was given their moment to shine, and the relationships between them are explored in satisfying detail.

Overall, "Kingdom of Ash" is a fantastic conclusion to the series. The world and characters that will be something that I think of often, it is utterly unforgettable. I highly recommended this series for anyone who loves epic fantasy, strong female characters, and a thrilling, action-packed story.

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