Is there an audiobook of A Court of Thorns and Roses?

Yes. A Court of Thorns and Roses has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Elizabeth Evans.

How long is the A Court of Thorns and Roses audiobook?

The A Court of Thorns and Roses audiobook runs 14 hr 4 min.

Is A Court of Thorns and Roses on Kindle Unlimited?

No. A Court of Thorns and Roses was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on September 11, 2026.

A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas book cover for the Book of the Day romantasy book review

Our score

4.8/ 5

Incredible

Listen to A Court of Thorns and Roses free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

EDITION PUBLISHEDMay 2015

Genres

Fiction Romantasy Fantasy

Themes

Bargains and the price of mercyHunger, poverty, and self-relianceLove as a choice made with open eyesArt as survivalSacrifice under impossible rules

A Court of Thorns and Roses

Name: A Court of Thorns and Roses
Price: 2.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: Sarah J. Maas

Sarah J. Maas

A Court of Thorns and Roses is Sarah J. Maas's Beauty and the Beast retold with claws out: a starving huntress kills the wrong wolf, gets dragged into faerie territory as payment, and finds a curse, a court, and a love story that keeps raising its own stakes. The book that made romantasy a shelf.

The Review

Our take

Feyre Archeron wants one thing when the book opens: to get a deer home before her family starves. What she gets instead, after her arrow finds a wolf that was never just a wolf, is a bargain straight out of the old stories. Her life is forfeit, unless she crosses the wall into Prythian and lives out her days on the estate of Tamlin, a High Fae lord whose face is locked behind a masquerade mask he never explains. She goes in planning escape. The book is about everything that happens to that plan.

Maas builds the Spring Court like a trap made of comfort. The food is endless, the grounds are beautiful, the company is charming in a way that keeps snagging on secrets, and Feyre, who has spent her whole adolescence as the only competent person in a house full of resentment, slowly starts to notice what it feels like to be cared for. Her painting is the tell. A girl who hoarded colors in her head through years of hunger finally gets a room full of paint, and Maas lets that matter as much as any ballroom scene. The romance works because it grows in the gaps of the mystery: why the masks, why the blight creeping at the borders, why Tamlin's easy manner cracks whenever she asks the right question.

About that romance: this is not a chaste fairy tale. The first book runs cooler than the sequels, but there are two genuinely steamy scenes here, one of them following the feral energy of Fire Night, and Maas writes desire with the same commitment she brings to violence. Readers who want their faerie courts strictly PG should know the door is open. Readers who came for exactly that will find the slow burn honest, and the payoff arrives at the moment the story stops being about captivity at all. Feyre, freed, standing in the safe human world she spent a third of the book scheming to reach, turns around. That choice, made with full knowledge of what waits behind her, is where the love story proves itself, and everything after it plays for keeps.

The back third is a different novel, and a better one. The garden-party pacing of the middle section, which some readers will find leisurely, turns out to be the deep breath before Under the Mountain, where Maas swaps courtship for trials, riddles, and a villain who enjoys her work. Amarantha is pure story-book cruelty given a court to run, and the sequence strips Feyre down to the traits that made her worth following on page one: stubbornness, hunger, and an absolute refusal to die politely. It reframes the whole book behind it. What looked like a romance with fantasy trimmings reveals itself as the origin story of someone much harder to break.

Why you should read

Great if enemies-of-circumstance to lovers is your favorite slow burn
Beauty and the Beast retellings with real menace
Readers who want romance and fantasy at equal volume
Fans of Feyre-style heroines: prickly, competent, hungry
Anyone starting romantasy and wanting the gateway book

What to expect

Leisurely courtly middle, brutal final act
Two explicit scenes; heat rises in later books
First-person narration locked tight to Feyre
Trials and riddles once Under the Mountain begins
A complete arc with a wide-open door to book two

A decade on, with the series a global phenomenon and the sequels famously outgrowing it, the first installment still does its job beautifully. It runs on older, simpler magic: a bargain, a curse, a girl who paints, and a kingdom that needs her more than it will admit.

Reviewed by Sloane · How our reviews are written

Our verdict

4.8/ 5

Incredible

Listen to A Court of Thorns and Roses free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

Where to read or listen

Is there an audiobook of A Court of Thorns and Roses?: Yes. A Court of Thorns and Roses has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Elizabeth Evans.
Listen to A Court of Thorns and Roses free with an Audible trial
We earn from qualifying Amazon purchases.
How long is the A Court of Thorns and Roses audiobook?: The A Court of Thorns and Roses audiobook runs 14 hr 4 min.
Is A Court of Thorns and Roses on Kindle Unlimited?: No. A Court of Thorns and Roses was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on September 11, 2026.
How much does A Court of Thorns and Roses cost?: On Amazon: Kindle $2.99, Paperback $13.51, Hardcover $13.09. Prices as of September 15, 2026 at 2:21 AM EDT and may change.

Filed underRomantasy Fantasy Browse the archive →

CollectionsBook Club Picks Browse collections →

On saleThis book’s price just dropped.See all current deals →

Read-alikesLoved this one? We picked what to read next.Books like A Court of Thorns and Roses →

More by Sarah J. MaasSee every Sarah J. Maas book we've reviewed, with our scores.All Sarah J. Maas books →

Common questions

What is A Court of Thorns and Roses about?: Feyre Archeron wants one thing when the book opens: to get a deer home before her family starves. What she gets instead, after her arrow finds a wolf that was never just a wolf, is a bargain straight out of the old stories. Her life is forfeit, unless she crosses the wall into Prythian and lives…
Is A Court of Thorns and Roses worth reading?: We scored A Court of Thorns and Roses 4.8 out of 5. A Court of Thorns and Roses is Sarah J. Maas's Beauty and the Beast retold with claws out: a starving huntress kills the wrong wolf, gets dragged into faerie territory as payment, and finds a curse, a court, and a love story that keeps raising its own stakes. The book that made…