Rating: ⭐️

Synopsis:

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

Review:

I finally gave into the hype and read Fourth Wing. I was going back and forth between 1 and 2 stars for the majority of the book. In the middle I thought that maybe it was ok, but the last like 150 pages made me firmly choose 1 star.

The first thing I’ll say is this is definitely a YA book and not adult in the slightest. Well I guess it’s YA with a couple brief adult smut scenes.

I started by listening to the audiobook and it was awful! The writing and characters came off as even more juvenile and irritating in this format. I’m so glad I switched to my print copy because I would not have been able to tolerate listening past chapter 4. I don’t know if it’s the narrator or just the way the writing is, but I definitely do not recommend the audiobook.

So my biggest issue with this book is that it is totally unoriginal verging on copying. I won’t get too into it because there are reviews from way more eloquent people who summarize it better. However, I do feel it’s necessary to point out that Fourth Wing felt like a mash up of a bunch of YA/new adult novels … specifically Divergent, Red Queen, ACOTAR, Crown of Feathers, An Ember in the Ashes, and From Blood & Ash. Nothing felt original or unique. I am not accusing the author of anything, but the similarities don’t sit very well with me.

My other big issues were

• The idiotic initial plot device: all I have to say is it was just plain stupid for the mom to force her daughter into being a rider. Dumb. Although we all knew that Violet was going to be a super powerful, ingenious, savant dragon rider. Because of course she is. And did you know she’s short and fragile? Don’t worry, if you missed it because it will get brought up again and again and again.
• Predictable. So so so predictable and following every trope and cliche. I had pretty much the whole plot figured out almost immediately. And the big twist was obvious to everyone except Violet.
• The characters all felt so young and immature. This is part of what made it feel so YA.
• Along with feeling young and immature, the characters just didn’t hit for me. I know this is only the first book in a series, but everyone felt very one dimensional and basic plus the world building was meh and very info-dumpy. There was very minimal background, substance, or history given to the characters. For example, I would have loved to know more about Violet’s time as a scribe, but all we get is that she can recite a lot of facts. Or Rhiannon. Literally all I know about her is that she’s a size 8 shoe and has a new nephew.
• I also felt like the scenes of Violet getting stronger and training (especially with Xaden) were lacking. We’re just told that she’s stronger, but we don’t really see it. We don’t get to actually see the character development. We’re just told it happens.
  • I think the character/world-building/substance problem could have been helped massively by multiple POVs.
• There is basically no romance for a book billed as a fantasy romance. There’s definitely sexual tension and Violet ogling Xaden, but no romance. It didn’t even really feel like that had any sort of friendship or relationship. It was a rushed enemies to lovers without actually exploring the enemies side or the developing friendship/relationship/feelings. It was just “I hate him but he’s hot.” And then all of a sudden they’re in love.
  • Violet’s declaration of love only had my eyes rolling. And Xaden’s too … he seemed to have a total personality change. Cheesy and absolutely ridiculous considering there was no character or relationship development. 
• The whole venin thing was also not done well. They’re mentioned a few times in passing, but not enough for it to really matter to me when Violet finds out they’re real. It felt like an afterthought to just drop them in at the end. It would have been better if there was more mentions and lore throughout the story. Also it’s idiotic that the only thing that can kill the venin is tiny daggers that you have to get super close to use.

Now you may be wondering why I kept reading. Despite all of my issues with this book I will say I was entertained. It was a fast and easy read and I didn’t have to think. And I wanted to give it a real chance. And I did like the dragons. They were really cool and I enjoyed the banter between the dragons and their riders. The dragons are obviously the best part of the book.

Overall Fourth Wing had a terrible beginning, an ok middle, and a super annoying eye roll inducing ending.