My Rating : 1.5 ⭐

Warning: This review has spoilers

Fourth Wing, as the internet tells me, is the best fantasy book written recently. What do I think? I am in absolute disbelief at how popular and hyped this book is. This book was my first BookTok recommended book and it was a tough read.

The story follows twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail, who is forced into one of the deadliest quadrants in a military war college. Violet goes through some extremely difficult trials during her time at Basgiath College and ends up falling in love with a guy who supposedly wants to kill her. The cadets who join the college pay a high price for failure: death. This book is sold as a fantasy with romantic elements. However, I would argue that it is a romance novel with some fantasy elements and subplots. The first 85% of the book is spent on the romance between Xaden and Violet and the remaining part of the book is where everything exciting happens. The romance is front and center in this book. The plot is extremely predictable and the main male character, Xaden is exactly what you would expect from a cliched romance novel: tall, dark, handsome.

There were multiple times I wanted to walk away from this book, but I continued because I don’t think I can review a book if I don’t complete it, so I did. The few times I ended up enjoying this book were when I turned off the critical-thinking part of my brain and just read. But, here’s the problem: sometimes I think about books when I’m not reading them, and my brain tries to make sense of things. And, this book has so many major plot holes that it just made me frustrated.

Writing ✍
The writing style was extremely distracting. In my opinion, the endless use of the F-word and other curse words is lazy. The English language has so many beautiful, descriptive words, yet the only adjective the author seems to use for everything—whether it’s events, people, or Violet’s inner monologue—is “f**ing”. The sentences are structured in a juvenile way, and the whole book reads like a movie script. All the characters—even the supposed high-ranking military figures—talk like teenagers from the 2020s. The world-building in the book is done by Violet literally reciting paragraphs from Navarre’s history while she faces a deadly situation, or by one character randomly spewing information to another, which the other character should already know. Needless to say, the writing was so bad it was distracting in various parts. Here is a quick example of Violet describing her feelings for Xaden:

“Flaming hot. Scorching hot. Gets-you-into-trouble-and-you-like-it level hot.”, “He doesn’t even try to look sexy. He just is.”, “I’m completely, utterly obsessed with Xaden.”, “He exists, and I’m turned on.”

Rebecca Yarros has one voice and every character speaks the same way. The last chapter of the book is written from Xaden’s point of view, but his voice is so similar to Violet’s that I had to remind myself that it was actually Xaden narrating.

Characters 👯
Violet: She is the most horny female character I have ever read in a supposedly fantasy novel. Death could be staring her right in the face, and if Xaden is in the same room, all she can think about is having sex with him. She is described as small, pale, and fragile with a disorder that gives her weak joints. However, to compensate for her physical inabilities, she is competent at everything. She is extremely good at making poison, she bonds with two dragons (which has never happened in Navarre’s history), she is great at shielding, and she is amazing at throwing daggers. I think this just makes her character so unrelatable and unrealistic.

Xaden: Tall and handsome with striking onyx eyes, Xaden has a refreshing scent of mint. He captivates Violet with his intense gaze and has a touching backstory, always looking out for others. I admire how he supports Violet in becoming stronger. The book introduces a love triangle with Xaden, Violet, and her childhood friend Dain, but Dain quickly reveals toxic traits, making it clear he was never a serious rival.

Other Characters: Another gripe with this book is that some of the side characters are not very well developed. Rhiannon, who is Violet’s best friend and ally, doesn’t get much attention, and I barely learned anything about her except that her sister is pregnant and will soon be giving birth. It feels like there was an opportunity for deeper exploration of their friendship, potentially showcasing pivotal moments that could have strengthened their bond and added a richer layer to the narrative. I do have to say my favorite side character is Liam Mairi, the shadow assigned to Violet by Xaden to make sure she doesn’t die or get killed.

Plot 📈
The plot is extremely clichéd and predictable in many places. It basically takes many tropes from The Hunger Games, Shadow and Bone, Harry Potter, and Divergent and puts it into one story. I can completely see why some people would find this enjoyable. It stirs up feelings of nostalgia and weaves all the common tropes from popular books into one. But, if you think critically about the events in this book, it leads to so many questions. For example, why do the cadets who fail at dragon rider school have to die? If the country is at war, wouldn’t it make more sense to use the cadets who don’t qualify in rider school in the infantry or other parts of the army? How are you replenishing your troops so quickly? The book never answers why the cadets have to die anyway; it just seems so ineffective to kill off perfectly good cadets. Next, there’s a war happening which is why young adults are forced into conscription into a military college. While there’s some surface level info given there’s so little world building that happens that I never understood what caused the war in the first place. Also, when Violet bonds with the mate of Xaden’s dragon, she acts as if she doesn’t have access to the archives that supposedly record everything that happens. Why would she not get a book in the archives that talks about the experience of previous mated dragons and their riders that could tell her how many days mated dragons can stay apart or what kind of connection she can expect with Xaden?

Romance 👩‍❤‍👨
Because this book is written in a first-person narrative, I never understood if Xaden is truly as amazing as Violet describes him, or if we are just viewing him through Violet’s rose-colored lenses. The romance between Violet and Xaden is set up to make the reader question if she can fall in love with someone who wants to kill her, but Xaden’s intention to kill her only lasts for two pages. You already know they will end up together in their first face-to-face interaction; the only remaining question is when. There were so many events in the book that could have been used to tell the story of enemies-to-lovers, but Rebecca Yarros instead reverts to using the age-old trope of love at first sight.

Fantasy 🐉
I absolutely love dragons, they are my favorite creatures in fantasy novels but this book, while it revolves around dragons, barely throws the spotlight on them. Even the dragons who are centuries old speak like teenagers. I wish we could have learnt more about the dragons but the book gives a lazy excuse for this by saying that despite dragons and riders having bonded for centuries dragons are mysterious creatures who do what they want.

Final Thoughts
I think the book being marketed as a fantasy-first novel is what annoys me. This is definitely a romantasy through and through. It makes complete sense why this book is so popular on BookTok. The demographic of readers there is different. It is meant for people who don’t read often or have taken a break from reading and haven’t read YA or fantasy in a while because there so many other YA/fantasy books that have the similar tropes and execute it better. If you can turn off your critical thinking, not over-analyze the plot and get past the god-awful writing, it can definitely be an enjoyable and fun read. I just struggled reading this book. Will I be reading the next books? Yes, because I am invested in the story and need to know how the story progresses.

Quotes I like:

You might not say it, but you do one better and show it. You show it every time you choose to trust me, every time your eyes linger on mine. You show it with every sparring lesson you don’t have time for and every flight lesson that pulls you away from your own studies. You show it when you refuse to touch me because you’re worried I don’t really want you, then show it again when you take the time to hunt down violets before a leadership meeting so I don’t wake up feeling alone. You show it in a million different ways. Please don’t deny it.

Read this if you: want a escape from real life, like fantasy/YA, like predictable tropes and cliches, romantasy
Title: Fourth Wing
Author: Rebecca Yarros
Publication Date: April 5th, 2023
Synopsis: 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 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 deadlier; 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.

Feature Photo by Elin Melaas on Unsplash