Last year, one of my favorite series of books was Rae Carson’s Girl of Fire and Thorns trilogy. I was very excited to discover there was a set of short stories written from this world as well, and even more excited when I received the collection from my sister at Christmas. A year after reading the original trilogy, I read the story collection.

There are three stories here, with a preface from Carson saying that these were background stories for some of the other characters from the series. “The Shadow Cats” tells Alodia’s story, “The Shattered Mountain” tells Mara’s story, and “The King’s Guard” tells Hector’s story. Each story is perfectly crafted, and drew me in just like each of the original books. I loved hearing these stories, and revisiting all the characters. It was everything I hoped for.