A Court of Thorns and Roses | Review •

« Be glad of your human heart, Feyre. Pity those who don't feel anything at all. »

Empty.

A profound, deep sense of emptiness spread through my bones and my soul the moment I read those last few words. 

"Let's go home". 

This book ended the moment I wanted it to continue, the moment I wanted not to leave that magical world I sunk myself in. 

I was not ready and I won't be ready for the end of it all, the moment I'll reach that last book. 

For how can you be ready to leave a place that almost feels like home? A place that only exists before your eyes, in dark black ink on those yellowish pages. 

And yet, there are really few places on this Earth that you feel so deep down in your flash and bones like that one. If I close my eyes, I don't even have to concentrate that much to imagine myself in the Spring Court, surrounded by green, flowers, ancient fountains and woods. How easy it is to get lost in it, to pretend even for a second that in this real life such a place does exist. 

I was there, with my beloved Feyre, fighting for her loved ones, clinging to the last breath to not get lost in the darkness of death. I was there when she fell in love with Tamlin, when she thought about Nesta the moment she realised her sister was the only one who could take care of their family while she was in the Fae Realm; when she was with Elain in the garden she herself loved to take care of. 

I was there. But I wasn't. 

And still, every word and every action were forever marked in my heart the moment I read them. 

The first time Rhysand was mentioned, the way he helped Feyre, his willingness to save her life nonetheless. His handsome appearance, his shadowes, his sarcasm and his being a total jerk. 

My favourite jerk. 

I was there when my sweet sweet Lucien protected the girl he once hated, for having killed his friend; when he first discovered how smart she was, what a wonderful human, how loyal, till death. Because that's what Feyre has always been since the first page, a perfect example of how complex a human being can be, always struggling between good and evil, dark and light, what is right and what is wrong. Always feeling so much and nothing at the same time. The perfect example of everything we can be, of how much strength we can find when we reach the bottom. 

Do you remember when you were thirteen, you started reading your first fantasy books and you felt safe in those pages? 

Do you recall that feeling of comfort, of happiness you had every time you sat on your bed reading? When you were entering a world that was all yours, only yours, in which to be free?
That's exactly what happened to me with A Court of Thorns and Roses. 

Reading it was almost a healing process. A way back to my roots, to those happy days I spent reading in class, writing fanfictions in my math notebook, only waiting for the bell to ring so I could go back home and met my book-boyfriend again. 

Page after page there were things I was not expecting, words and places that all the spoilers I read during these years could not prepare me for. I thought I knew all about this first book, but in reality, I didn't know anything. And I am so glad about it.

I would have never known, back when I bought it, that it would have destroyed me from the inside. 

This book made me feel, which is something I had not done for a long time. 

I  found myself laughing, grinning, giggling and smiling; I hated some characters with all my heart and I loved others more than I could imagine.

I felt Feyre's humiliation during the trials, her pain, her love. I felt her hate towards her family and her relief the moment she understood she was free from her promise.
This reading was like one of my sweet, tempting, delicious maladaptive daydreams, one from which I'd never wake up.

And oh, the tears I shed once I reached the last page, you cannot imagine. 

Warm and happy tears. 

A small and silent cry of a little Kore that, after a time so long it almost felt eternal, found herself again through the pages of a red-covered book. 

A book that taught her that she is still worthy of love, 𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑟𝑛𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎𝑙𝑙.