Fourth Wing
Rebecca Yarros
Violet has been training to become a scribe like her father, rather than a dragon rider like her older sister, decreased brother and cold mother. At the last moment, Violet must pass the parapet and become a rider – where not all the riders will be chosen by dragons… and not all would-be riders will survive.
Character development? Not really. Amazing world-building? Yup, maybe! Fun storyline where you can’t decide whether you want the protagonist to live or die? 100%! Although I had no real prediction as to how it was going to go down, the ending was highly satisfying.
I’m not sure they are grumpy enough dragons (or that there’s enough dragon time)! I mean, when we get to the final parade in front of them, I felt like they could have incinerated a couple more of the cadets. If they aren’t going to choose them all, why not put the others out of their misery?
Winner! Another main character with a physical disability that doesn’t let it get in the way of what she wants to do (see also: A Curse so Dark and Lonely). Damn, girl! I guessed the ending just a couple of pages out from the end of the book and was 100% paranoid that the book was going to end before I confirmed it.
If you’re sensitive to, well, erotica, this might not be the book for you. Violet definitely spends a fair bit of time thinking about sex, and then it gets worse as you progress through the book! The first half is relatively safe though
For once it’s not a group of 15-16 year olds fighting it out, it’s actual adults. I really appreciated that aspect and it made the violence seem slightly less out of place? I think that the way young children are killed off in something like The Hunger Games very dystopian. It’s an uncomfortable thought to know that although that’s a fantasty world, in the real world children are dying right now anyway.
I couldn’t stop reading it and after some time has passed and the second book is published, I will be all there for a reread.
Hachette | 9 May 2023 | AU$32.99 | paperback
