Empire of Storms, Sarah J Maas, 2016
Boom boom boom is what Empire of Storms would sound like if I were to say boom every time Sarah gal weaved me away from earth and into her beautiful world and action.
Be fair warned, you will be met with spoilers. Please proceed:
If you’re a rare kind soul who keeps up with my Throne of Glass series book reviews, you know I’ve been in a real TOG slump for the past two books (Heir of Fire and Queen of Shadows). Rest assured, readers, Empire of Storms has gotten me re-hooked. My favorite of the six so far. Or tied with Crown of Midnight, which I rated 4.5 stars.
I did NOT do the tandem read. The most popular reading order for TOG is to read book 6 Empire of Storms in tandem with book 7, Tower of Dawn, as they follow different characters but are happening at the same time. I decided against the tandem read because although it has become the preferred way, I enjoy seeing how an author puts a novel together from start to finish. To merge the two novels would be to lose the author’s intended story pacing and disclosure of content.
Anyway.
There are four romantic storylines. I repeat FOUR romantic storylines. We have the tried and true Rowan and Aelin, our main homie g’s—though, hot-take, the least interesting of the romantic plots—Dorian and Manon, Aedion and Lysandra, and, my personal favorite, Lorcan and Elide.
The ships are definitely the girlie pop’s favorite part of the series. I say Rowan and Aelin are the least interesting because at this point we’ve seen Chaol and Aelin, Dorian and Aelin, and Sam and Aelin, and she’s felt essentially the same for all of them.
Aelin and Sam were first love rivals to lovers, and the series begins with him already dead. I do ship Aelin and Sam, mainly because I’m a sucker for a heart wrenching end, and since Aelin lost Sam, I believe she will always love him most. For that reason, he tops anybody else for me.
Chaol and Dorian are my lover boys. Chaol is a brooding but kindhearted and morally sound mush, whereas Dorian is a tortured bad boy horndog Prince, chivalrous and venerable. For a while I was a big fan of the Aelin and Chaol ship, but around Heir of Fire I started to believe he deserves better than her. Dorian too—deserves better.
Rowan is Aelin’s mate. This is news to us in Empire of Storms as it’s news to Rowan. Maeve had used power to trick him into believing Lyria had been his mate before she died, and so he thought he was fated to never have a true mate again. It isn’t until near the end of Empire of Storms that Rowan and Aelin realize they are mated to each other. My biggest critique of the Throne of Glass series may be Rowan and Aelin, because until finding out they’re mates, they really don’t make much sense. It is only their lust for each other that they have in common, which feels small to the adolescence she shared with Sam, the trauma and tension with Chaol, and the royal kinship/understanding she has with Dorian. Her connection with Rowan begins with attraction. He’s a really large fae male and she wants to jump his bones. And he, too, is always having to use conscious control not to rip her clothes off. Like, be so for real right now. Once they become mates, we can sort of concede our own tastes and believe that we can’t understand the strength of a mating bond, and so they make a little more sense. But, still.
A huge TOG fan friend of mine explained this to me in a way that actually did change my opinion: she said that since Rowan believed Lyria was his mate, he has a hard time allowing himself to fall in love with Aelin, and so it is easier to sexualize her. If that is the true psychology of Rowan, then sure. There’s at least some nuance to that relationship, and so I capitulate.
Okokok, let’s go back to the beginning and give a quick summary of this large one here. Aelin Galathynius is the lost Princess and rightful Queen of Terrasen, though she was in hiding under the name Celaena as an Assassin for eight years while Adarlan, King of Rifthold, overtook the continent of Erilea and expunged magic. Hired as Adarlan’s personal assassin and living in his castle, Aelin is met with her ancestor Elena and put on a mission to find the missing Wyrdkeys which will replenish magic and defeat Adarlan and the evil darkness which has him possessed, known as Erawan, who leads a dark army called the Valg.
In Empire of Storms, the interim leaders of Terrasen are apprehensive to trust Aelin as Queen. To earn their trust, she seeks out armies to ally with against Erawan and the Valg; these armies include Manon and her Thirteen witches, Captain Rolfe’s pirates on Skull’s Bay, the Mycenians, the Silent Assassins of the Red Desert, and her cousin Galan Ashryver of Wendlyn. The armies only arrive after Aelin’s final showdown with Maeve, her Great Aunt and Fae Queen of Doranelle who, too, is fighting for the Wyrdkeys and power in opposition to the Valg.
So, basically, Empire of Storms is Aelin’s journey to find allies for Terrasen and Rifthold (led by Dorian since his Valg possessed father was defeated) in their fight against Erawan and the Valg, while Maeve intends to fight Aelin to keep the wyrdkeys for herself. Lorcan is Maeve’s bonded Fae servant who has gone against Maeve’s wishes to save her from her intentions to get the power of the dark Valg. In his journey to secure and destroy the wyrdkeys, he runs into Elide, daughter of Lady Marion of Perranth of Terrasen and friend of Manon of the Blackbeak witches. Elide is traveling North to find Aelin and give her the black stone that possessed Lady Kaltain, victim of the Valg. The tension between Lorcan and Elide is immaculate, as he is indebted and in love with Maeve, but is attracted to and cares for Elide. Their plotline is very fun amidst all the action of battle and magic wars—they act as husband and wife to join a traveling circus to bring them toward Aelin. Really it’s ambient and cutesy. Their dynamic is my favorite in the book—we see a new side of Elide when she is with Lorcan; it is as if he builds her confidence and sense of agency.The most memorable scenes for me are between them in the traveling circus.
The plotline of Manon, wingleader of the Blackbeak coven, finally gets interesting in Empire of Storms. It is revealed that she is indeed a Crochan witch, the clan hunted by all others, as they are known for having hearts where the other witches don’t. This explains Manon’s unprecedented and unexplained guilt and moral compass as a Blackbeak. In a showdown with her grandmother in which this is revealed, she is badly injured and brought to Dorian, aboard ship with Aelin, Rowan, Aedion, and Lysandra, by her wyvern Abraxos. Manon and Dorian have their own little dalliance, which is only a physical attraction thus far, but I’m okay with it. It is more convincing than Rowan and Aelin, whom we are told have a deep connection but aren’t shown anything super compelling other than their lust and their mating bond.
Aedion and Lysandra are another cutie ship. They’re fun together, just kind of sweet. Their care for one another seems real, though at the end of Empire of Storms Aedion is unable to forgive Lysandra after learning that she was in cahoots with Aelin all along to submit to Queen Maeve and essentially lose her life.
You heard that? Empire of Storms ends in a confrontation between Aelin and Maeve, in which Maeve wagers Aelin’s capture for Elide’s life. Lorcan and Elide’s little dalliance here is smushed to freaking pieces when Elide finds out that Lorcan led her right to Maeve, and will side with Maeve always. Maeve ends up severing her life bond from him anyway, leaving him absolutely heartwrecked. Aelin, submitting to save Elide’s life, is whipped to shreds and put into an iron coffin, taken away by Maeve.
The novel ends with Lysandra, according to their plan, shape-shifting into Aelin to lead the army that is now equal in number to the Valg soldiers. Lysandra will act as Aelin and marry and procreate with Aedion, which has always been expected of them, while Rowan and Lorcan and Elide go forward to fight Maeve and save the real Aelin.
I might go 5/5 with this one, but I’ll keep it to 4.5/5 because the main romance is Rowan and Aelin, and I’m really just not a big fan.
Anyway, ahh! I think part of my enjoyment of Empire of Storms is that there were three budding romances outside of Rowan and Aelin, so the action was balanced really well with sweet, ride or die scenes.
