fourth wingWhen I first heard about Fourth Wing, I mentally catalogued it as not interested. Dragons are cool but elite military schools and spice aren’t really my thing. However, so many people I trust have enjoyed it, so I finally dived in. It’s not perfect, but I had a lot of fun reading it.

If you’ve been living under a rock this past year, Fourth Wing is a fantasy set in a world at war with its neighbours. Dragons have partnered with humans to help defend the borders of their home. Potential dragon riders must first survive the deadly first year of Basgiath War College, where only the fittest will survive. Violet, the main character, was expecting to be training as a scribe, but her mother, a general in the army, has decided for some unknown reason to send her youngest daughter to Basgiath.

It didn’t have anywhere near as much sex as I was expecting. Lots of the characters are having sex off page, but maybe there were two sex scenes in the whole book? It wasn’t all over the place and, when it did happen, it seemed to further the plot.

I was also expecting the relationship to be toxic, but I don’t think anything Xaden does sent off alarm bells of abuse. Children shouldn’t be blamed for their parents’ actions, so there wasn’t any real issue in them forgiving each other for the unforgivable. It’s set up from the start for you to question Violet’s mother, who is forcing her daughter into a career she didn’t choose or train for. When Xaden first meets Violet, again it’s clearly signposted that he sees she is not entirely like her mother. I do have a bit of a soft spot for the misunderstood bad guy trope.

The first-person narrative from only one character kind of hinders the worldbuilding a bit. I was really annoyed about the whole war for much of the book. I get it, they’re military recruits, they’re not known for questioning things. But I had questions. What is this war about? Who are the enemy? Why was there a rebellion? Why are they so happy to kill so many recruits before they’ve even reached the battlefield? I didn’t buy into the whole weeding out the weakest narrative for a few reasons.

Not everyone gets into Basgiath War College. There’s a selection process before the book even begins, and then they lose some people on the way up the mountain. If you’re at war, why would you not value these people you have selected as the best? Even if they don’t make it as dragon riders, surely they’d have a place in the war effort. Jack’s personal vendetta against Violet seemed like the kind of insubordination that wouldn’t be tolerated in an army. At some point you have to learn to work together.

Then the dragons are misunderstood by most of the college. They don’t value physical strength over everything else; they were mostly only incinerating intolerable twits. You would too, if you were going to be bonded to them for the rest of your life. But for the sake of the narrative, we have to believe some dragons don’t have the same values and would bond with someone who is a liability. And I don’t mean Violet.

Because Violet is strong. She has to work harder than anyone else to get where she is. I feel like there’s a lot of ableism going on in the reviews that complain about her being such a moany weakling. She has a connective tissue disorder (which I understand the author has too). I have zero problem with someone placing disabled characters in a fantasy world and letting them thrive. All she needed were a few accommodations (some that would make sense to help reduce the death toll across the whole quadrant).

Fortunately, the ending sorted out some of my concerns about the worldbuilding. I am not desperate to read book two, especially as I’ve heard it’s not quite as good, but I will probably pick it up at some point in the future.

Sure, Fourth Wing derivative, but when you borrow things from so many sources, it becomes something new along the way. That’s kind of what creative writing is all about.

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