Series review: Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

Reading timeline: 3 January 2024 – 9 May 2024
Overall rating: 4.25/5

An eight-part series which includes a collection of short stories that acts as the prequel, the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J. Maas is a long and brilliant young adult fantasy series that follows the story of Celaena Sardothien—the greatest assassin in Rifthold.

We’ve been on quite the journey to get here, and now it’s time to wrap this epic series up.
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I have tried to limit the spoilers in this series wrap up, however with so many books and so many plot twists here, there and everywhere, I would proceed with caution. To be safe, I’d suggest reading the series first before jumping into this!

Want to read the individual book reviews? You can find them below:

• The Assassin’s Blade
• Throne of Glass
• Crown of Midnight
• Heir of Fire
• Queen of Shadows
• Empire of Storms
• Tower of Dawn
• Kingdom of Ash

The Assassin’s Blade
We began this journey back with The Assassin’s Blade—which was also the first book review published on new TaleInferno! This book is a collection of short stories and acts as the prequel to the Throne of Glass series.

It was published after Crown of Midnight, and some people do choose to read after the second book to be true to the publishing order. I believe it’s called the ‘romantic’ order, or something like that. However, for me, reading The Assassin’s Blade first is a must as it sets up the first book and namesake of the series brilliantly.
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With that in mind, The Assassin’s Blade got a rating of 4/5. It tears open the heart, and provides a really nice insight into why Celaena is the way she is. It’s also a really easy collection of five stories to read. However, some stories don’t quite stack up to the others.

Throne of Glass
Then, into Throne of Glass. It’s the first book of the series and takes place a year after the ending of the final novella in The Assassin’s Blade. By reading the collection of short stories prior to Throne of Glass, a lot of Celaena’s actions, behaviours and feelings make a lot more sense.

And, honestly, if it wasn’t for The Assassin’s Blade, I would’ve rated this book a lot less than I did because I think the beginning would have been very difficult for me to get into.

However, the rating I did give it was a strong 4.5/5. It had me hooked right in and was really easy to read. It has its cringe moments, and it has some really strong, sweet romance scenes. It’s a nice mixture of all that fun and not so fun stuff, and is a great way to kick off an epic series.

Crown of Midnight
The second instalment, Crown of Midnight, was a bit of a let down for me after a very epic first book. It took me a bit of time to get into, and once I was in, there were some slower and very annoying parts to the storyline that had me wanting to throw the book across the room.

Let’s just say I don’t like it when characters who know they should say or do something…don’t. Particularly when it’s clear that if they do, the anger or conflict probably would resolve itself. And there’s a little bit of this in this story.

It does have some really sweet romance moments, however, so that’s a positive.

Overall, it got a 3.75/5 from me.

Heir of Fire
Onto book three: Heir of Fire, and I’m hooked right back in. After the disappointment of Crown of Midnight, I took to Heir of Fire immediately. Set in a different location with a bunch of new characters, it felt refreshed and reinvigorated.

This book received a 4.5/5 from me. This book is where we see the omniscient narrator truly shine, and is probably the book I find it works the best compared to the rest of the series. And, this is the book where we’re introduced to my favourite character: Manon Blackbeak.

What pulled the rating back from a full 5/5 was the same issue as Crown of Midnight: people not openly communicating—a total pet peeve of mine. And yes, while I get it’s to add drama and conflict, it just didn’t feel good in this book.

Queen of Shadows
Book 4--Queen of Shadows—absolutely blew my socks off. Out of all the books in the series, this is probably my favourite. I also really love the front cover for some reason. The rich red, the cape, just… Chef’s Kiss.

This book really elevates the action and feels like it could be finale in itself with how epic the story is and how it ends. However, if you’ve read the book/series, you’ll know there’s a whole lot more yet to happen after this one.

This book got a strong 4.75/5 from me. The issues I had with lack of open communication causing conflict still existed, but it didn’t annoy me so much—I feel like it was executed a lot better in this book than the previous.

However, what did bring down the rating to pull it away from a full 5/5 was just how many perspectives we end up having in this book compared to the ones before. I love omniscient narrators, and Maas does a brilliant job in writing this way.

One particular perspective didn’t gel with me fully, but it was one perspective where we see some really intense moments behind enemy lines, so I was able to push through it.

Empire of Storms
We then jump right into book 5: Empire of Storms. I gave it a rating of 4.5/5, but the funny thing is—I can’t really pick one particular thing I liked about this book.

The whole story is epic to me, and unfortunately does suffer the same ‘too many perspectives’ feel for me like with Queen of Shadows.

The ending though?! Maas knows how to write a really good ending that will have you ripping the next book out of the shelf to get right into it, and this book… well, let’s just say: WOW.

This book and the next--Tower of Dawn—can be read in tandem. I won’t mention why as that would be a bit of a spoiler, but they’re set on the same timeline. There are guides online available if you want to try and read between the two.

I didn’t do this. However, I can completely understand why people do.

Tower of Dawn
Book 6--Tower of Dawn—branches off with a few characters (I won’t say who) and, as I mentioned before, runs along the same timeline as Empire of Storms.

It’s set in a separate and new location, and the perspectives are limited, so it was quite a refreshing read. However, after following an epic finale like Empire of Storms, this book can be a bit difficult to get into. So much so it took me well over a month to read it.

Nonetheless, it still got a solid rating from me, receiving a 4.5/5 (just like Empire of Storms!). While it takes a bit to get into at first, it does up the ante with the action as it progresses. And, honestly, I’m super happy this was a standalone book rather than trying to compress this storyline and perspectives within another.

That probably would’ve made my head explode!

Kingdom of Ash
Then, it’s onto the actual finale: Kingdom of Ash. The two storylines of Empire of Storms and Tower of Dawn converge together as we find ourselves in this epic conclusion.

Where we leave off in Empire of Storms makes this book a real joy to finally jump into after the pause we have in Tower of Dawn (which is why I completely understand reading those two books in tandem). After what happens at the end of book 5, you’re truly gripped into wondering how these characters are going to get their happy ending.

It’s hard to really summarise the epicness of this final book without stepping into major spoiler territory, but let’s just say: I cried, and am still crying over some scenes, and it was an absolute pleasure to read this whole series just to get to this ending.

Because this ending… this series is worth reading just to get to this ending—Maas truly does it brilliantly.

With that being said, this epic finale received a 4.75/5 from me. Why not a full 5/5 rating? You guessed it—the perspectives. This was at a whole other level in this book, however, the story itself is incredible that while it was a bit disorientating at times, it didn’t bring down the epicness level (how many times have I said the word epic now??).

Series review summary
The Throne of Glass series is a truly epic young adult fantasy series. Having 8 books in total (including the prequel short stories), it’s a story that keeps the hype going from beginning to the end (with a small blip in book 2, but just push past it—trust me, it’s worth it).

Celaena, while a naïve and sometimes very annoying character at the beginning, really grows a lot throughout this series. The character development we see is astounding, and each of the characters that are introduced have some well-rounded development from when they’re introduced to their final moments.

Well, I’d say there’s one character in my mind that is the exemption to that, who is the character I didn’t really gel with back in Queen of Shadows. But, anyway, so it goes—they can’t all be perfect!

I think this series is a true testament to the fantasy genre, particularly for a young adult audience. Although I will say, there are some scenes in the later books that would probably get a M15+ kind of rating in the movie world—potentially higher—so keep that in mind before you start handing out this book to the young ones (although I do note that M15+ does mean over 15, which is pretty much young adult… you know what I mean!).

What did you think about this series? Did you enjoy it as much as me? What moments didn’t gel with you, or was the whole series a 5/5 for you—beginning to end? Let me know in the comments!