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Summary
“Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders from New York Times 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.”
-From Amazon.com
Review
So this review is honestly going to be a bit of a hot take. I’ll be up front and say that I really didn’t enjoy this book. With all the hype around it and then all the positive things I had seen about it, I had high expectations. I even got this for myself as a birthday gift and honestly….I regret it. Please keep in mind these are my personal opinions.
More than half the book didn’t really go anywhere.
Honestly I felt like a lot of the book didn’t really go anywhere. It was just about Violet training and having this weird verbal sparring match with Xaden and this odd sexual tension that was constantly a will they/won’t they feeling. I was waiting for something to actually happen and then that was thrown at you at the very end like…what? I mean I don’t mind books set in academies or something, but I just felt this kept rehashing the same thing over and over again in the book.
I felt the story could have progressed at a much faster pace and cut down on some of the pages. There was plenty in this book, in my opinion, that I felt did not add to the story at all. It was just there to read.
Um…dragons….where you at?
Considering the academy had dragons, I didn’t really feel you got to connect with the dragons. They are a big part of the academy where Violet was and I just didn’t feel that they were a major part of the story. I didn’t get to really imagine the dragons or connect with them. A lot of the dragon interactions, for the most part, was through their mental communications so you kind of had this weird disconnect so I wasn’t able to imagine them or really realize they were dragons. Kind of a let down as I love dragons.
What spice are you even talking about?
Now I know that this is technically a YA book so spice can only be so much (although that is a whole other conversation right there), I felt all the spice in this book was pretty lame. Admittedly I have read a lot of spice books so this didn’t feel like spice. For a new spice reader, this would have possibly been a decent bit. But for what people were saying with “Oh Xaden *bats eye lashes*” I honestly didn’t see it. Xaden annoyed the heck out of me for the most part and he wouldn’t really be ranked in like my top 50 of bookish boyfriends. I’d give this like a 2/5 on the spice scale.
Violet – weakling or dragoness in disguise??
If you’ve been here for a hot second you know I love a strong MC, especially when they’re a female. But Violet just wasn’t it. Sure she progressed from this little weak girl but I just felt there was a lot of babying her and even through her little journey to find herself she didn’t come as far as I would have though. I just didn’t connect with her at all, her character progression was a little lacking and I just felt that with the story and the world, what she became just wasn’t it. Admittedly she is against Xaden who is this arrogant thing with a pretty large ego, but I just still wasn’t feeling it.
A little inconsistent and some holes in the story.
I did feel the story was missing things. Like things touches on and missed, things suddenly happening with little explanation, bits of the story being very rushed. It felt some areas that didn’t need as much got more focus than others that needed more attention given.
However, ultimately, an enjoyable single read.
With all that criticism above, it is still worth a peek if you have time maybe. This is the kind of the book that I would say is a book to put on the back burner and maybe read when you are in a reading slump or don’t have anything else. I doubt I will be reading it again which kind of says a lot to me. I regret buying it but I don’t fully regret reading it. It had so much potential with the story and the idea and that is why I was interested. But I just felt, sadly, it underdelivered with all the hype.
I’d give this a 2.75/5 star rating.
What are your thoughts on this book? Do you agree? Do you feel that it was slightly overhyped?
Happy Reading!
