REVIEW: Iron Flame

By Denise @ Life With No Plot on January 5, 2024 • ( 0 )

Now that my review for Fourth Wing is done, we can move on to the next bit . . .

About the Book

Title: Iron Flame

Author: Rebecca Yarros

Series: The Empyrean #2

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 640

Edition Read: Kindle eBook

Dates Read: December 23 – 29, 2023

Blurb: Everyone expected Violet Sorrengail to die during her first year at Basgiath War College—Violet included. But Threshing was only the first impossible test meant to weed out the weak-willed, the unworthy, and the unlucky.

Now the real training begins, and Violet’s already wondering how she’ll get through. It’s not just that it’s grueling and maliciously brutal, or even that it’s designed to stretch the riders’ capacity for pain beyond endurance. It’s the new vice commandant, who’s made it his personal mission to teach Violet exactly how powerless she is–unless she betrays the man she loves.

Although Violet’s body might be weaker and frailer than everyone else’s, she still has her wits—and a will of iron. And leadership is forgetting the most important lesson Basgiath has taught her: Dragon riders make their own rules.

But a determination to survive won’t be enough this year.

Because Violet knows the real secret hidden for centuries at Basgiath War College—and nothing, not even dragon fire, may be enough to save them in the end.

Review

I’m going to get this off my chest first and foremost . . .

HOW DO YOU HAVE THAT MUCH OF A CLIFFHANGER WHEN THERE IS NO RELEASE INFORMATION FOR BOOK THREE YET!!!!!! HOW LONG DO WE HAVE TO SUFFER!!!!!!

Ahem. Sorry about that. Moving on to the actual review.

I really liked this book. We get to see so much more of the world, learn so much more about the dragons (Tairn needs to be the voice inside my head, seriously), and so much more about how interconnected certain conspiracies might be. We still have Violet being a badass, but she’s also maturing and understanding exactly what she wants out of life. I really liked seeing her growth in this book. We learn a bit more about Xaden, what makes him tick, and why he is as difficult to read as he is. That boy has so many secrets, I don’t know if we’ll ever know them all.

I do have a complaint, however, and that is of our main antagonists: the venin. They are presented at first as sort of bogeymen, evil creatures who may not even be real. Later we find out that they are incredibly real and deadly. But that’s it. They are a bit bland, a force of evil that has no seeming reason for why they are evil in the first place. They are just a force to be reckoned with and that’s it.

This is not to say that we don’t have other antagonists within the human ranks. Vice Commandant Varrish is a terrible person who, while technically part of the “good side,” relishes torture and has it out for Violet and Xaden from the beginning. We also have a reappearance of Jack Barlowe, who you may remember from Fourth Wing. He seems less of a jerk this time around, but trust me, he is even more of a monster now.

This book is full of tense battle scenes and lots of intrigue. Both books in this series are fairly long, but it is so easy to read through it quickly. I couldn’t put it down. And yes, I need to know when we get book #3 stat!

GoodReads rating: 5 stars