Revisiting House of Earth and Blood

As everyone knows, we adore Sarah J Maas over here. She’s our fantasy queen and we will devour anything she throws at us. So it is no shock that we are crazy excited for the second Crescent City novel being released later this month. That excitement pushed us to do a re-read of House of Earth and Blood so we could reboot our memories of what happened and we wanted to share our thoughts with you all, including our predictions for what will happen in House of Sky and Breath. Please join us in this journey and don't forget to check out our teas! They are available on this site as well as Etsy.
​
“Bryce Quinlan had the perfect life—working hard all day and partying all night—until a demon murdered her closest friends, leaving her bereft, wounded, and alone. When the accused is behind bars but the crimes start up again, Bryce finds herself at the heart of the investigation. She’ll do whatever it takes to avenge their deaths.
Hunt Athalar is a notorious Fallen angel, now enslaved to the Archangels he once attempted to overthrow. His brutal skills and incredible strength have been set to one purpose—to assassinate his boss’s enemies, no questions asked. But with a demon wreaking havoc in the city, he’s offered an irresistible deal: help Bryce find the murderer, and his freedom will be within reach.
As Bryce and Hunt dig deep into Crescent City’s underbelly, they discover a dark power that threatens everything and everyone they hold dear, and they find, in each other, a blazing passion—one that could set them both free, if they’d only let it.”

---

Ashli: Finally we are back to some Sarah J Maas magic! I am super excited that we are re-reading House of Earth and Blood before House of Sky and Breath is released later this month. To start it off, I will admit that Crescent City is my favourite of Maas’ work. With it being labelled as adult, she really got to let loose and I was here for it. It’s gritty, dark, and heart wrenching. I also loved all the little references to her other works which we will be discussing for sure. Maas throws us into Lunathion super fast which I actually like. I am someone who needs to be able to relate to the characters more than the world, so I liked that the world was introduced slowly because I got to know the characters first. Novels that spend a long time explaining the world before I become invested in the characters are ones that I end up closing and never returning to. Cough Lord of the Rings Cough. It’s the character relationships that Maas did the best with this book. 

Erin: And here we already disagree, haha. While in the end I loved this book, for me it took too much brain power to understand what was going on and all the people involved, the Houses, the different powers (Asteri, Archangels, Lords, a random Autumn King and a Viper Queen) I still don’t have my head quite wrapped around it, but as you said– it's the characters that have my interest. 

A: Bryce is my badass role model… While she didn’t act so hot in the beginning with all the drug and alcohol bingeing, she got her shit together in her grief. She is a woman who isn’t afraid to grieve but uses it to her advantage. Closer to the end of this first instalment, her poise is overwhelmingly perfect. Anyone who can nonchalantly vacuum the ashes of their enemy after literally almost dying at their hands is my hero. Actually let’s be clear… Other than Feyre and her sisters (sorry Erin but I can’t stand them), Maas is the queen of badass women. 

E: Read our other blog post on A Court of Silver Flames where I fight for Nesta ;) 

A: So many people are predicting that Bryce and Hunt are not our end game couple… and I am okay with that. Connor was (and still is) my number one pick for Bryce so it is super sad that he is for sure off the table. My number two pick for her is Aidas, but selfishly I also really don’t want them to be a couple because I want him all for myself. Perhaps there will be a new alphahole in HOSAB for us to root for? Preferably another beautiful shifter for me to drool over? 

E: Maas never has her female lead end up with the first guy so maybe Connor counts? Yes, yes he’s dead but it was still a love interest! I realize I’m grasping haha.  Quite often though she lures us into a relationship and it seems like it would have obviously been end game, but then it all goes to shit. (example, Aelin and Chaol). I love Bryce and Hunt together, but with 4 (?) books left there’s a lot that could happen. 

E: Something I thought was a bit odd was how devastated Bryce was about what happened with Hunt and the drugs and how she never wanted to speak to him again– but she was looking for a way to help him and get him out of his situation. 

A: I can’t talk about Crescent City without fangirling over the otters. I’m super super excited to meet all 500% more of them in HOSAB! I’ve started playing the new Pokemon game on the Switch and I’m collecting otters like crazy so I can name them all after the Lunathion otters. Actually, this book in general is chock full of amazing animals. Syrinx is one of the most beautiful babies… I was ready to kill Micah myself if he actually harmed my little chimaera. 

E: Speaking of Micah, he made the perfect bad guy. I'm kind of sad he died quickly. That whole scene had me at the edge though, and I cried for what happened to Lele and Syrinx. 

A: I still do love Amarantha and Maeve from her other series as my main Maas villains. My hope is that we have some more villains who were just as good as the others in the coming books. What I did like was how Micah’s villain status was a bit more hidden. Yes he had the angels enslaved to him, but at first he felt like a regular old ruler in a fantasy setting. It was nice to get the “ah ha” moment rather than knowing all along what his role would be. 

E: I want to talk about Ruhn! I hope we see more from him in book 2 with Hypaxia . For me, with his shadows and telepathy, it is totally escaping me what they call this in ACOMAF but anyways, he seems like a descendant of Azriel. Or maybe I just want Azriel so bad I’ll see him anywhere. 

A: You see your Illyrians everywhere. But I do agree that there are definitely some alignments with the other novels that seem to tie the worlds together in a way. Like the Book of Breathing and the dig about alphaholes with their three day sex fests/ locking women in their houses. Any dig at Tamlin will make me want to be your best friend so I was quite pleased with that piece of dialogue between Bryce and my darling Danika. 

E: I loved that reference ! I hope we get more glimpses and nods to the other books, it’s like finding a code or a Taylor Swift easter egg . 

A: I think we should leave this off with what Houses we would be in and a prediction for book 2… I’m House of Earth and Blood born (obviously I’d be a shifter… probably turning into a lynx or a black panther) but I’d likely have followed suit with Jesiba and deflected to the House of Flame and Shadow. I’m way too interested in darker characters to not want to be in the “evil” house... I just have to be shifter born though so I gotta deflect. As for book 2… I want the otters to take over Lunathion and become the supreme rulers with my lover boy Aidas. 

E: Okay so this was hard for me because whenever there’s witches I want to be at that party. I’d like to follow Jesiba but right now it seems … dull? I’m hoping when we get a book with that house title it’ll give me more. I think I would be in the House of Many Waters. Let me bask in the glory of Tharion! As far as predictions! There are a lot of nods to mythology in this book so I was trying to think of how it all ties together. Jesiba is very clearly Circe — Greek goddess who was tossed out and became known as the witch of her own island and turned men into pigs. She had a lover/ husband in Odysseus. With how much Aidas seems to know, and how he seems to be playing the long game when it comes to Bryce- I think he and Jesiba have a history and maybe even a plan to overthrow the Asteri. 
Because Hunt has his lightning and that’s very Zeus energy (pardon the pun), I’m wondering if he’s like a fallen star, or a descendent of an Asteri? I think because the book ended well in terms of Bryce and Hunt’s relationship, we’re going to have some drama. There needs to be a new leader of the Archangels and I’m almost wondering if Shahar is still alive? Maybe Sandriel kept her and tortured her or tortured Hunt by making him believe she was dead? That would certainly complicate things!

Did we predict correctly? Find out in a few weeks when we dive into House of Sky of Breath! February is officially Sarah J Maas month and we are here for it.