Book Review – Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas

First off, a big congratulations to ME because I submitted my PhD thesis this week! After four-years slaving away over a hot monkey brain (not really!) it’s finally done! YAY FOR ME!!!

Anyway… Empire of Storms…(Come for the review, stay for my self-congratulations!)

So as with most sequels, I won’t be giving out any spoilers for any of the other books in this series in this review, but I will STRONGLY encourage you to go read the first book, because this series is still A-M-A-Z-I-N-G-!

This is now the fifth book in this series (if you don’t count the book of prequel short stories) and this series is still awesome. Firstly, we are introduced to lots of new exciting places in this instalment of the series, which was pretty cool.

Like always there is plenty of our plucky young protagonist setting everything on fire (both figuratively and literally), and there are LOTS of ships in this book (both figuratively and literally – lots of fun, romantic times on the high seas to be had by all!).

This book is just another fantastic instalment of this series.

However… It seemed too short…. I know this thing is clocking in at well over 700 pages, and making it much longer wouldn’t have really been practical… but honestly, it just wasn’t enough for me. I just wanted it to not end (I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request. I would like a never-ending version of this book immediately please! Chop chop!). I was just watching the pages tick away and desperate for it to not end, and I am one of those people who loves finishing books (it makes me feel accomplished, okay?!), but I was just begging my book not to end… but it did. WHEN IS THE NEXT ONE ALREADY!!!???!!!! I HAVE A MIGHTY NEED!!! Okay, so I guess I can’t really count this as criticism.

My only other criticism was that there were a lot (and I mean A LOT) of references to stuff from the prequel short stories (otherwise known as The Assassin’s Blade), which I have not read. So sometimes I was a little lost. I didn’t realise that reading the sequels was so essential in this series. So if you have not read those, I think you would get more out of this book if you did go ahead and read those first.

But that minor little detail aside, I LOVED this book, just like I LOVED the last three (strangely I didn’t LOVE the first book, but the rest have thoroughly made up for it) books. What can I say, let’s just crown Sarah J. Maas as the Queen of Everything and be done with it.

I rate it 4.5/5 stars!

Tea pairing: Firebird Song Zhong Dancong (say that ten times fast!) by Bitterleaf Teas.

This tea is a dancong oolong from Pheonix mountain in the Guangdong Provence in China. Dancong teas take on different flavours (despite not actually being flavoured), and this one has a sweet caramel, treacle taste with a burst of dried fruits and flowers. It’s completely unsubtle and decadent, just like this book.

Also, there is a super awesome new Throne of Glass colouring book which I will do a post on in the next couple of days (after I’ve brushed up on my colouring inside the lines), because it’s my first and favourite adult colouring book! Yay!

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Find stuff here:

Empire of Storms:

Release date: 6th September, 2016

Publisher: Bloomsbury (here)

RRP (Aus): $17.99

Goodreads. The Book Depository. Amazon. Kobo.

Previous reviews:

Crown of Midnight. Heir of Fire. Queen of Shadows.

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Thank you to Bloomsbury Australia for providing me with a copy of this book for review.

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