Oh, There You Are Rebecca!
Reviewed in the United States on August 24, 2024 | Rating: 5/5 | Best Sellers in Audible Books & Originals
in my review of the first book i noted that rebecca yarros had studied the genre well and stitched together a delightful homage to the darlings of ya fantasy i was expecting much of the same in the second one and started the long trek through its pages with the resignation of a reader with the chronic inability to leave a story unfinished even if my hopes for the sequel aren’t high in this case i was not sure what was left for yarros to bring to the table i was additionally concerned because in my experience second books in longer series tend to be somewhat lackluster doing none of the creative heavy lifting of first books that deliver the whole worldbuilding charactercreating problemdelivering shebang nor holding the lion’s share of the action escalation and resolution of third and later installments the second book is so often a bridge a flat plane in which the author catches their breath while the reader jogs determinedly on in pursuit of the next rising arc of the storynot so with iron flame to my surprise and pleasure the second book is where rebecca yarros shows that she can breathe her own fire and torches all predictability to ash our favorite characters are back deepening into new dimensions of self and wrestling with the fact that the political is painfully personal when it comes to war we learn more about dragons more about tactics more about love and more about secrets— including that we still have a tantalizing trove of them left to unearthadditionally rebecca yarros demonstrates a talent for imbuing this series with a glorious element of “yes and…” every answer to a riddle every solution to a problem opens up another issue and creates more questions yarros does not spoon feed anything to her audience and nothing comes easy but there’s enough there for the reader to put the puzzle together just as violet does if they are quick and clever enough for this reader more often than not the reveals were accompanied by the satisfying feeling of things clicking into place and an audible “goddamnit of course” as well as agitated thumbing back through my kindle to reread the clues hidden subtly along the way all of which fit to bear up the weight of the author’s premise none of the surprises yarros delivers feel sloppy random or untrue to the characters that she has created and the cliffhanger at the end packs a gut punch i never would have seen coming i cannot wait to see what she has for store for us in january