Fire

Title: Fire
Author: Kristin Cashore
Series: Graceling Realm #2
Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Young Adult
Spice: 1 / 5
Format: Hard Cover
Pages: 480
Reason Read: Just Because
Rating:

Also in this series: Bitterblue

My Thoughts

I adored FIRE. I thought the story was very intriguing and captivating. There were a lot of elements I enjoyed immensely–friendship, betrayal, heartbreak, grief, and love.

I loved the concept of Monsters and their powers just as much as I loved the concept of Gracelings and their graces. It was interesting to see mind powers from so many different POVs. I loved watching Fire grow into herself and becoming the woman she wanted to be instead of the woman / creature everyone expected her to be. I also loved the romance between her Prince Brigan. I loved their banter and camaraderie. It was delicious and entertaining.

This wasn’t a direct sequel to GRACELING. It was actually more of a prequel, but as a companion novel. Fortunately, I knew this and didn’t go in expecting more Katsa and Po. Otherwise, I would’ve been utterly disappointed. Either book can be read first because there was only one cross-over character. That character, though. Wow!

I loved the delicate weaving of the cross-over character into the plot. Even though he didn’t have a huge part to play in this book, I think the effect he had on the inhabitants of the Dells could be used in BITTERBLUE. However, even if Cashore doesn’t tie all three books together through the cross-over character, I still thought his role in this book was interesting.