The hardest thing about reading a popular (and LONG!) series when all your books come from the library is trying to get them in order.
So my understanding is, that this book was written third but was intended to be read first. And I’m really glad I didn’t read it first because man, I hated Celaena in this book. She is incredibly arrogant, bad-tempered, hostile, vain, and spoiled. She is so self-involved she doesn’t even realize she likes Sam until he tells her he’s in love with her. (Why? Who knows! Her looks I guess, because she doesn’t have anything else going for her.)
Maybe it’s all because she’s 16 and has the emotional maturity of an alley cat?
Given that she is a professional killer and even mentions at one point that she’s tortured people, I did find her drawing the line at slavery to be a little out of character. But OK, I can roll with that. But then her helping the healer seemed even more out of character. Maybe it’s supposed to indicate that she’s maturing, that she’s finally noticing people outside herself?
I have a lot of questions about the Mute Master. I don’t get the impression that Arobynn and the Mute Master know each other so he just sends one of his students into the desert keep without any idea of what will actually happen once she gets there. Fortunately the Mute Master is a much better person than Arobynn. Honestly, there’s where I would have headed once Caelana and Sam were free of the Guild, and I don’t know why that option never came up.
So this book establishes how Calaena ended up in the salt mines but it also introduces some characters that I expect we will see again in later books. Celaena is still in Rifthold while she works for the King, so it’s reasonable to expect she will cross paths with Arobynn again. Possibly also with Farran, the man she accidentally makes the crime lord.
But I would also really like to see Yrene pop up again somewhere in the future. And maybe also Dia, or one of the other slaves she freed. Oh and now that I think of it, further resolution with Ansel would be pretty cool. (Why did she and Sam not think about going to Briarcliff to work with Ansel? Well OK I know why, but it still would have been really cool.)