This is an odd book in the series. It’s very short, most of the events spanning only about a week of time and it really feels like it only exist to set the stage for book five.

It takes place over the Winter Soltice, Feyre’s first in Velaris. In the Night Court the longest night of the year has special significance and the whole gang is getting together to feast and swap gifts. Whatever action takes place during that time is limited to whatever best describes the relationships between all the players.

Ferye and Rhysand of course, are nauseatingly lovey-dovey. No surprises there.

The bat boys are their usual ridiculous selves. Apparently they’ve spent that last 500 or so solstices having snowball fights, which should surprise exactly zero people. I’m also not even a little bit surprised that Azriel wins most of them.

Morrigan is at a crossroads. She was offered the role of emissary to the other courts. Her main worry is that her father would think she was leaving because of him. Why she gives a flying rat’s ass what he thinks of her decisions is something only 500 years of therapy could possibly untangle, but I hope for her sake she takes the job.

Amren’s personality has not changed one bit since becoming an ordinary (ha!) High Fae instead of an immortal death-machine. She still acts like she could kill you with a thought and everybody just accepts that because that’s who she is. Only now she’s plooking a Prince, which is just so normal it’s weird for everybody else and honestly, good for her.

Then there’s the Archeron sisters. Feyre is happy to have Elain continue living with them, and I guess it has been only barely a year, which is nothing for the fae. I would be worried that she doesn’t seem to have any ambition or interests other than living in her sister’s house. Maybe that will become an issue in a hundred years or so.

Then there’s Nesta. Hoo boy. She is obviously not happy about being in Velaris and she definitely does not want to be a part of the Scooby gang. To be honest I think Fayre is being kind of clueless about it. Going back to being human or living in Rhysand’s court can’t possibly be the only two options available to Nesta, but Feyre is so smitten with her new life she wants to sweep everybody she cares about into her little family.

And that brings me to Lucien, because I think the interaction between Lucien and Feyre is very telling. Feyre doesn’t understand why Lucien wouldn’t want to get a place in Valeris, wouldn’t want to be close to her and her family. She might even be a bit jealous, he was the closest thing she had to a friend when she was in the Spring Court and now he’s gone off and found a life she didn’t arrange for him. So she’s kind of an asshole to him when he tells her about the Band of Exiles. He has found a place for himself in the world where he feels valuable outside of both the Spring Court and the Night Court and that’s a good thing. I think she should learn to feel happy for that.

I also think Elain was kind of an asshole to him. Yeah, she doesn’t want a mate, but it’s not like the mating bond is something he’s doing to her. He doesn’t have a choice in it either.

And last and most certainly least, we have Tamlin. Who is apparently so depressed even his servants won’t live in the manor. Now speaking as somebody who has struggled with life-long depression AND who has had an ex who got aggressively depressed to the point where he weaponized his misery – let me tell you, it’s just self-indulgent bullshit. All that energy spent trashing his rooms could be used for something, anything else. He’s just enjoying his pity-party too much.

One of the things I do like about Maas’s writing that she likes to repeat patterns. In ACOFAS Feyre starts off the book working for a charity for people injured or displaced by the war. At the end of the book she is once again dedicating her time to a charity – but it’s one she has founded and that uses her love of art to help children. A circle, but one that has come around to a better place than where she started.