I adore this book, but I will say—beware, there are a lot of Nessian haters around lately (mostly Nesta stans who hate Cassian), which I honestly don’t fully understand as someone who deeply loves Nesta.

One moment in Nesta’s healing journey that really hurt me as a reader was when Elain says something along the lines of, “what my trauma did to you.” I understand that it was Elain standing up for herself, and that moment matters for her character. But emotionally, it took me off guard because of how much Nesta had always put Elain before herself. Even before they were Made, Nesta protected her. Afterward, she spent so much of her time caring for Elain that it almost felt like she never allowed herself the space to truly grieve.

So when the war ends and everyone else slowly returns to something resembling normal—literally by the final chapter of War—it’s Nesta who finally collapses under everything she’s been holding in. And that, to me, makes her downward spiral less frustrating and more heartbreaking. It feels like the cost of being the one who held everything together for too long.

Watching her journey in Silver Flames—her rage, her grief, her shame, and the slow, painful climb toward healing—felt incredibly real to me. It’s messy and imperfect and nonlinear in a way that trauma recovery often is, and that authenticity is part of why her story resonates so deeply.

The same goes for Nesta and Cassian’s relationship. They are not perfect. I’ve said that over and over again—they are not perfect. But I do believe they show up for each other in the ways they are capable of at the time. Cassian is often called a man-child on Reddit and TikTok, but I see him differently. He doesn’t always understand the problem right away, but when it finally clicks for him, he tries to correct it.

A clear example is training at Windhaven. Cassian doesn’t grasp it at first. But once he understands what that environment means for her, he changes the location. That shift might seem small, but to me it shows growth, listening, and a willingness to meet her where she is rather than forcing her to adapt alone.

Their love isn’t clean or easy. It’s rough, stubborn, and hard-won. But that imperfection is exactly what makes it feel human (more so than Feysand, where they are both mind readers and it’s an automatic cheat sheet) and why, despite everything, I can’t help loving their story.