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House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1) by Sarah J. Maas

A spoiler free review, as always.

4/5 ⭐️

I mean, it's a Sarah J. Maas novel. Honestly... I got exactly what I was expecting. Characters you hate to love and characters you love to hate. Background characters that NEED more attention, or even spinoffs. Girls that kick ass, literally. Everyone is attractive. EVERYONE. It's trashy, and tooth rotingly so, but it also has a really decent plot and a quality that makes it the kind of trash you can't put down because, let's face it, it's entertaining!

What I have to say I appreciated is the fact that while this is Sarah's first "adult" novel, that's not due to the explicit content (of which there is very little considering the book is 800 pages long and not YA) so much as the fact that the characters are actually all adults, which means everything they did and said actually fit the premise and could be freely explored. It was fast paced, actually incredibly amusing at some points (I genuinely laughed out loud at some lines), and also really, really honest. There's open talk about slut-shaming, drugs, alcohol, sex, body image, consent and harassment, corruption, sibling relationships, family, toxicity, mental health (PTSD, anxiety, depression, etc.), friendship, loyalty... you get it. AND the world building was well very developed, as always. I’ve actually always thought that world building, if nothing else, is one of SJM’s great strengths as an author. The world she invented here is intriguing, as it is relatable to our own, but is also incredibly creative. It’s modern, urban, yet old, based on myth. It’s intricate, corrupt yet beautiful. Suffice it to say it’s different than anything she’s written before and I genuinely loved it.

HoEaB was a mystery that actually kept me intrigued the whole time and I have very few complaints other than Sarah's frequent pottymouth and the fact that just because the protagonist is stubborn, bratty, and at times a royal b*tch doesn't make her a strong female. But even that issue is explicitly addressed in the book, and by one of the main characters at that, so... I was appeased. My only real complaint is this: could SJM stop with the scenting and the male/female vocab and the "john touched jane and hEr SkIn WaS oN fIrE" bs? Sometimes it feels like the cast is a pack of zoo animals in a rut. Or a group of teenagers. Another thing I took issue with was the usual, exclusively physically perfect, racially ambiguous characterization that reads like everyone is white, but could also be brown depending on who’s asking. It doesn’t actually represent anyone but overly tan Californians. I do suppose, however, that being a bit trashy is her style, and I recognize that it is (regretfully) part of the reason a lot of us pick up her books in the first place.

In conclusion: Is it my favorite book of the year? No. Is it my favorite book by SJM? No. But will I still recommend it on account of it being a very honest, intriguing, inventive, entertaining, and plot-twist-filled page-turner? Absolutely.

In the HOFAS bonus chapter why did Ember not notice that Rhysand looks like Rhun just like Bryce did ? I mean Ember was descriptive and mentioned anything else I doubt she could have missed out something like that so easily ?