Review--Ice Like Fire by Sara Raasch

It’s been three months since the Winterians were freed and Spring’s king, Angra, disappeared—thanks largely to the help of Cordell.

Meira just wants her people to be safe. When Cordellan debt forces the Winterians to dig their mines for payment, they unearth something powerful and possibly dangerous: Primoria’s lost chasm of magic. Theron sees this find as an opportunity—with this much magic, the world can finally stand against threats like Angra. But Meira fears the danger the chasm poses—the last time the world had access to so much magic, it spawned the Decay. So when the king of Cordell orders the two on a mission across the kingdoms of Primoria to discover the chasm’s secrets, Meira plans to use the trip to garner support to keep the chasm shut and Winter safe—even if it means clashing with Theron. But can she do so without endangering the people she loves?

Mather just wants to be free. The horrors inflicted on the Winterians hang fresh and raw in Januari—leaving Winter vulnerable to Cordell’s growing oppression. When Meira leaves to search for allies, he decides to take Winter’s security into his own hands. Can he rebuild his broken kingdom and protect them from new threats?

As the web of power and deception weaves tighter, Theron fights for magic, Mather fights for freedom—and Meira starts to wonder if she should be fighting not just for Winter, but for the world.

I finally, finally read Sara Raasch's Ice Like Fire! I remember after reading Snow Like Ashes and enjoying it, the reviews for this one were a little mixed. They were saying that this reads like a very middle book and then of course it picks up in the end and leaves off with cliffhangers, and naturally that gets me going to wait to read it with the third book together! I just didn't realize that this was a 2015 book, yikes!

After reading a recap of the first book, I was totally unprepared to plop myself back into a series! Lol! Yeah...my memory has been shot with all the reading I've done! Don't ask me to be on your trivia team, I won't be offended, I'll warn you even! Lol. But anyway, I was able to get back into the swing of things fairly well. I knew the basics of what happened before and I guess you could say we pick up right where we left off, well three months later at least.

Meira is trying to fit into her role as queen of the newly reinstated Winterians. It's an adjustment to say the least as her whole world had been turned upside down, as well as her friend, Mather's. Meria has a debt to pay to Noam and the Cordell kingdom for their help in Winter getting their kingdom back and in order to do that the Winterians are digging in the minds trying to find the magic chasm, which will hold untold power and magic for anyone to use.

Things move a little slow around this point. When they discover that they need keys to open this chasm once it was found, Meira and Theron are sent off on a "tour of the kingdoms" basically an excuse of sorts that they can look for the keys rumored to be hidden there. But Meira has no intentions of relinquishing the keys once she finds them. She doesn't think that Noam should have that kind of power in his hands. Theron though is a whole other issue. There are times she feels like they are on the same side and then suddenly, she feels like he has plans of his own.

In the meantime, we see Mather trying to train the Winterians in battle, but their skills are severely lacking. And when Noam decides that Winterians don't need to do the training anymore, Mather and a select group of others continue anyway, not willing to trust Cordell at all.

There's also a suspicion that maybe Agra, the big bad from the first book might not be gone after all...or is someone else continuing his work? It's all very mysterious and Meira is struggling with who she can trust. Everyone seems to have their own game plan and at the center of it all seems to be the magic chasm that they found.

While I can't remember much about Snow Like Ashes, I feel like saying that Ice Like Fire is a very middle book rings true. Not much happened really but for laying the groundwork for the final book and then a few shocking events happened with the last handful of pages to really get you hooked. It's sad when that happens in a trilogy, but since my poor addled mind can't remember much of the first book, I don't know how to feel about this one really. Trying to remember the characters themselves was a struggle. I probably need to start binge reading series from this point on! Lol.

I was also sad that there wasn't as much romance this time...or maybe just in general? Things between Meira and Theron are tense. There are a few stolen moments, but they weren't very swoony. In retrospect though, I like how strong Meira is that she doesn't feel like she needs to have a guy in her life. At least at this point in time. Right now, her focus is on her kingdom and I admire her strength and bravery in that manner.

The best part about waiting to read a series though is the binging you get to do! I'm glad I can dive right into the third and final book in this series and I am anxious to see how it will all come to an end. Those shocking events and somewhat cliffhangers were pretty dire and I am anxious to see what the outcome will be. 

The consensus now to reading series is that I either need to re-read the prior books--which is just sooo unlikely--or I need to resort to waiting and binge reading them so my mind doesn't struggle to remember all the things. My note taking does tend to help but sadly I had no notes for the first book in this series. I'm learning from my mistakes is all I can say!


Overall Rating 3.5/5 stars