I used to be an avid reader as a child, and between college and life in general, I’ve been too busy to read. Lately, though, I’ve been trying to rekindle my love for reading, and one of the books I decided to pick up, as recommended by my mom, is Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros. Currently, only the first two books are out; Fourth Wing came out in April of this year, followed by its sequel, Iron Flame, in November. It’s part of the author’s “Empyrean” series, slated to have five books in the series total, so we can expect more releases of this series in the next couple of years.
General Plot
Fourth Wing follows 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail in a fantasy college setting where cadets train to become members of different occupations. In Violet’s case, she spent years training to become a scribe, someone who has extensive knowledge and bookkeeping of the world they live in. However, her aspirating career path is derailed when her mother, a general in the ongoing war, forces her to become a rider to follow the paths of herself and her talented older siblings, Mira, a lieutenant, and Brennan, a brilliant rider who passed away in combat.
Violet, though, is often described as small and having a weak body, and in Basgiath War College, as a rider, you train for three years to become a rider made for war. In this training, you have to fight, or you will die. Violet has to make her way through her first year as a rider without dying, all the while avoiding people who want her dead because of her association with her mother, who executed multiple traitors’ parents. The surviving children of these parents are in Basgiath College with her, thirsty for her blood, including the biggest threat of them all, Xaden Riorson, a talented third-year student who hates her guts.
Now that I’ve covered the general plot, the next sections will be in spoiler territory, so if you haven’t read Fourth Wing and plan on it, come back to this review when you’re finished!
Dragons and Threshing
Yes, this series has dragons! One of my favorite elements of this story is in part of their training, one of the first major events Violet and the future riders must prepare for is called Threshing. This is where you are sent to the woods to pair up with a dragon to start bonding with, and they fight together in the ongoing war. These dragons offer riders a unique gift, a signet, that is determined based on the dragon itself and the rider’s personality. They don’t get it immediately, but once a rider earns their dragon’s trust, they will slowly siphon their power to the rider, and their signet will develop.
I loved reading the Threshing part of the book, wondering what dragon Violet will bond with. You even get a short scene of some of the dragons that are open to bonding beforehand, and even if I found it slightly predictable, I was still riveted. In the end, Violet bonds with two dragons, which is entirely unheard of. She first bonds with a black dragon, Tairneanach, or Tairn for short, and she bonds with a small, golden dragon named Andarnaurram, or Andarna. She protected Andarna from a small group of riders who felt she was too weak to be of any use, and Tairn admired Violet’s sense of honor and they both chose her.
This section of the story also shows an element of the world that I didn’t expect. The dragon and its rider can telepathically communicate with one another, which comes as a shock to Violet initially. Andarna is sweet and childlike, contrasted by Tairn’s stern arrogance. Even with Andarna’s sweetness, she has the wicked ability to temporarily stop time. However, this greatly drains her, being a youngling, and requires several days of sleep to recover.
Tairn is one of the largest and most powerful dragons in the region, and often this comes as a lot of doubt for Violet, as she feels she’s not strong enough to have a dragon so strong, but Tairn insists dragons don’t make wrong choices about their riders. Violet eventually finally develops her signet, which is the power to wield lightning.
While I loved reading about Threshing, I will say that once Tairn was introduced, I knew he was going to Violet’s dragon, so when he finally showed up to choose her, I felt validated in my assumption. It did, however, surprise me when both dragons chose her because I didn’t think that was going to occur.
Another interesting element is how Tairn is Xaden’s dragon’s mate. Sgaeyl, a blue dragon, and Tairn are a bonded pair that cannot be separated for more than a few days, and with that, all of them, with the exception of Andarna, can communicate with each other. This leads to…
Xaden Riorson
I couldn’t quite pinpoint my feelings on Xaden’s development on his feelings for Violet at first. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy a good enemies-to-lovers plot, and I feel it is comparable to Feyre and Rhysand’s development in A Court of Thorns and Roses series. I had also made the assumption from the moment his name was dropped that he was going to be Violet’s main love interest.
You also have her childhood friend, Dain Aetos, who’s a second year in Basgiath, and Violet has a crush on him, but after a few scenes with him, I already wasn’t a big fan of his. He was smothering Violet, believing she should sneak away to the scribe quadrant so that Violet wouldn’t die, but after some time, Violet decided she didn’t want to anymore and wanted to prove herself as a rider. He’s also a stickler with rules, following orders to a T even if it hurts Violet and other people, using his signet power of mind reading by touching someone’s face. This is something that comes back in a horrible way later.
Xaden is a different story. They’re the popular enemies-to-lovers trope, which is admittedly one of my favorite romance tropes. However, I don’t know how much I’m convinced of his facade about hating Violet. He spends at least half of the book plotting to kill her, but once Threshing occurs, the complication arises that with their dragons bonded, they themselves are connected to their dragons intimately. If one rider dies, for example, Violet, there’s a very real possibility that Tairn will die too, which in turn would kill Sgaeyl and Xaden. So his mission goes from wanting to kill Violet for her mother’s actions of executing his traitorous father to keeping her alive so they don’t all die. In this, they finally bond more, and Xaden starts to let her in. By the end of the book, they’re both completely in love with each other.
I do think my confusion about how this could’ve developed into romance is simply how much Xaden really seemed to hate her guts for a while. I understand it, too, because even if it was her mother who killed her father and not her, it would be hard to separate those feelings from seeing one of the daughters at school. Even so, the very last chapter of the book is from Xaden’s perspective, and you get a deeper understanding that perhaps he never actually did hate Violet, and it was a facade to keep himself distant so he couldn’t hurt anyone he truly loved.
You see that he may have started being attracted to her as soon as he first saw her, and the same goes for Violet. She avoided him as much as she could, but she had an undeniable attraction that eventually led to a literally fiery sex scene. Violet’s signet, a power she can’t completely control yet, sets fire to the nearby woods during their intimate scenes.
The Ending
In the end, though, Xaden did, in her eyes, betray and hurt Violet by keeping big secrets from her. While he never directly lied, he lied by omission about the truth of Basgiath and the war, something you don’t get a good understanding of until the second book, which I haven’t gotten to yet. (But will very soon!)
There’s a big battle against these monsters called venin, something Violet only thought they were fiction from her time as a practicing scribe. Venin are people who figured out how to channel great power without the use of dragons or other creatures. While those in power of their country, Navarre, had them believing they were fighting and protecting their borders for a good cause, it turns out they kept Venin and another dangerous creature, wyverns.
Violet gets poisoned and injured in the battle after saving the surviving members that were set up as a trap by Dain and eventually wakes up. Despite believing Xaden about the truth of their country, she no longer has trust for Xaden. The story leaves off when Brennan, her previously thought deceased brother, comes into the room, having been fighting against Navarre all this time.
This is a brilliant cliffhanger that, luckily I don’t need to wait long for the next book, as I have it nearby as of writing this review. I’m intrigued to know how she will feel about Brennan’s return, Dain’s complete betrayal and knowingly leaving her to die, and how she and Xaden are going to mend their relationship over the course of Iron Flame.
I hadn’t even covered half of the jam-packed action this story contains. As someone who isn’t hugely familiar with fantasy but wants to, this is a good book to get started with, and while I do think some plot points are predictable, it’s still thoroughly enjoyable. Stay tuned for book 2!
