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*No spoilers – just vibes* 

House of Flame and Shadow
By Sarah J. Maas
🎧 Narrated by: Elizabeth Evans
Book 13 of 2024

I have an instagram post with my advice about starting with the world of SJM, and after finishing Crescent City 3: House of Flame and Shadow, I stand by it. I think you will get the *best* reading experience reading the first 3 ACOTAR, all of TOG, the next 2 ACOTAR, and then the Crescent City series. The worlds build on each other, so I think that’s the simplest way to read and be able to catch all of the Easter Eggs sprinkled throughout the worlds.

The Crescent City series is urban fantasy, which I hadn’t read a lot of before diving in, and at first I didn’t like it. Fae, Angels, Demons, Wolf Shifters…and cell phones? And as we often see with SJM heroines, Bryce doesn’t really begin the books as her best self. But it went from jarring – the modern language, the swearing, and again – the cell phones – to something I was absolutely in love with. Bryce is the kind of sassy heroine that I fell in love with reading about since I was a kid, and she reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, who is one of my favorite fictional characters. 

I think Book 1 is entirely from Bryce’s POV, but by Book 2 we have multi-POVs. Book 3 switches around even in the middle of chapters, so I think reading it in print is really helpful. However, Maas does well starting each POV clearly, and Elizabeth Evans’ narration makes it pretty clear who we’re following. While I felt like Book 1 had SO MUCH worldbuilding, and Book 2 had SO MUCH hanging out and learning about characters, Book 3 was straight action. The characters didn’t always make decisions that I agreed with, but they were decisions that were true to who they are as people. Overall, it was a very satisfying experience! 

I think what makes reading SJM so fun is the fandom surrounding it. As someone who grew up reading Harry Potter, I crave having a series that I’m reading as it comes out that I can make fan theories about and talk about with other readers. I sometimes wonder if I’m really a true fantasy fan or if I just like to join the fandom of 1-3 ongoing series and ignore the rest of the fantasy books that are being published! 

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Fable buddy read! And thank you to all of the people who held my hand through my SJM journey!