Review--Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros

 

Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders from USA Today bestselling author Rebecca Yarros

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

Everything you're hearing about Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing is absolutely the truth! If you're ready for an action packed, magically breathtaking, and heartbreakingly romantic read that will steal your breath away then this is the read for you. Also be aware that this is most definitely an adult novel. While the heroine is just past teen years, you could call this New Adult. I don't think I've seen the f-word used so many times on one page before and throughout a novel as a whole, but there you go!

Right away I found myself connecting to Violet in certain ways. She's the daughter of a powerful commander mother, her older brother died a war hero, and her older sister is one of the best dragon riders in the provinces. But unlike her siblings, Violet does not have that physical strength. As a child she had medical issues and that turned her into the adult woman she is today, who can easily be broken. But for untold reasons, her mother wants her to be a rider instead of a scribe as she longed to be.

With no other choice she's off to the school that will either train her to be a dragon rider or she will die trying. Even those who are better fit than her will still lose their lives somewhere in their three years of training. Violet isn't happy with the course that's forced upon her, but she's not going to back down from the impossible challenge set before her. Even when she learns that a great deal of the students at this school are children of the dissenters. There was a great battle a few years ago, one her brother fought in and lost his life when a man was set against the king of the provinces and wanted to tear down the structure of life everyone lived by. It was an ugly battle, but the king granted mercy upon the dissenters' children if they were to join the riders, which that in itself is almost a death sentence since not many can survive the years leading up to graduation. And at the helm of all this is Xanden, the son of the man who started the war that ultimately killed her brother...and Violet's mother was the one to execute his father, so there's no love lost between these two.

So naturally, we all know what's to come between them! But I will say that it's not something that happens instantaneously. In fact, this was an ultimate enemies to lovers situation as Violet is certain that Xanden would rather murder her than let the grueling trials of college do her in. That and the fact that Violet makes an enemy of one of the other students on her first day. Surprisingly, not a child of a dissenter but just a regular old douche bag.

Every first year is training to be physically fit and worthy of becoming a dragon rider. That eventually leads to trying to earn themselves a dragon, for the rider doesn't get to pick the dragon, the dragon picks the rider.

There's almost 500 pages of story in this book and a lot happens over the course of a year. Violet makes friends, she makes enemies. It's a wild ride for sure! The story even reminded me of another one I read years ago, but instead of dragons that one involved vampires (naturally!) and while I saw some similarities with the competition within the school that trains young adults to be protectors essentially, but that is about all they shared. I was expecting to see a lot of "school days" scenarios going down in this one and while we do get that sense with classes and tests and challenges, there was a whole lot more to this one. Though Violet appears weak at first glance, she is a force to be reckoned with and I so, so admired her for all that she accomplishes while being looked upon as someone who is weak and pitiful.

I also wasn't expecting to see Violet make true friendships in this one! At a cutthroat school where only the best of the best can win and even those who do win may not even be chosen by a dragon, you don't really expect anyone to be genuine or kind. But I was happy to be proven wrong in this one.

Then there's the every complicated relationship brewing between Violet and Xaden. Xaden being the son of the most hated man in the provinces, he's a dangerous unknown entity and yet he and Violet continually circle one another. They have an odd dynamic where they are never quite sure of the other one and eventually that evolves into something deeper. Honestly, none of it was a surprise. I mean the blurb pretty much tells you that without telling you that, as any reader could tell you.

I do enjoy the slow burn romance though. The ones that take time to build and where the lovers start out as enemies of a kind.

This book was just full of surprises and I pretty much loved every moment of it! The pacing was sort of a slow buildup but in a way it was more like Yarros was slowly reeling the reader in by giving little nibbles of the ultimately entertaining moments and then letting us simmer before reeling us in deeper as the pages went by. True, some fighting moments felt a bit drawn out but in a sense, I can kind of understand why those moments had to take up so much time.

The ending...oh that ending! As soon as I finish writing this I am going back to read the blurb of Iron Flame because I wouldn't let myself read that the other day when it was revealed! The ending is something of a cliffhanger, but not one where you scream at the agony of the wait ahead of you. It's the kind of explosive ending that just gears you up for the next book and all the excitement that's to come from it! You won't scream in agony, but you will have emotions. My emotions are rolling all over the place! From the looks of things, Fourth Wing was Yarros' first Fantasy novel and what a novel it was! I mean you can't go wrong with DRAGONS! Dragons are everything in fantasy! All I can really say that the hype behind this series is justified! This was an incredibly epic and amazing read that held me riveted from start to finish! Violet is my new favorite heroine that I can relate to! She's a girl I will root for until the very end! If you're ready to be reeled into the spellbinding new fantasy everyone is raving about then be sure to pick up a copy soon! 

And on a side note, I can't decide if it's a good thing or not that we get the sequel before the end of the year because the real question remains...what happens AFTER THAT?! How long will that wait be? Time will tell I suppose, but I'll be here for it for sure!

Overall Rating 5/5 stars