Book Review: Fourth Wing (The Empyrean #1) by Rebecca Yarros

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Hope is a fickle, dangerous thing. It steals your focus and aims it toward the possibilities instead of keeping it where it belongs—on the probabilities.

Summary:

Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders…

Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders.

But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away…because dragons don’t bond to “fragile” humans. They incinerate them.

With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant.

She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise.

Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom’s protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret.

Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die

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My Thoughts:

It was no surprise to me that Fourth Wing won best the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Romantasy in 2023. I read Fourth Wing in a day. It has been so popular since its release. Fourth Wing was a fun time, but it didn’t blow me away.

I loved how easy it was to digest. I wasn’t pondering complex magic or political systems, it was all very straight forward. It was a much needed break during a research heavy part of the year for me. If you are looking to get into fantasy, I think Fourth Wing is a great place to start. From there you can decide if you want to continue with Romantasy or further into the fantasy realm where you will find less romantic interactions.

Over the years, I have grown to really enjoy the new adult genre, but something about Fourth Wing felt like YA to me. I can only assume it is the “young person goes away to a boarding school and turns out to be the chosen one” plot that has grown old to me. I am burnt out on the amount of magical schools I have read about. I know it is not about the school, and this is a War College, but one in the same is that there is a school involved. I am begging authors to send your characters straight to war, skip the school.

Violet isn’t perfect, which adds interest to the story. But not nearly as much interest as Xaden Riorson. I loved the chemistry between these two and how their are intertwined. If they don’t end up together by the end of this series I will be very disappointed. And then there are the dragons. I loved the dragons and at times was only reading to get more dragon interactions.

Overall, I had a fun time reading Fourth Wing. I rated it fourth stars, it was fun, easy to read, there are dragons, there are secrets, and I liked Violet and Xaden together.

I did jump straight into book two, Iron Flame, and DNF. That is a post for another time.

Should you read Fourth Wing?

If you are new to fantasy and seek a little spice, yes. If you are a well established fantasy reader, ask yourself what are you looking for? If you seek a good time with dragons and a war college, check it out. If you seek a high fantasy adventure, this may not be the book for you.