The Burning Sky (Elemental Trilogy, #1)

by Sherry Thomas

It all began with a ruined elixir and an accidental bolt of lightning…

Iolanthe Seabourne is the greatest elemental mage of her generation—or so she's being told. The one prophesied for years to be the savior of The Realm. It is her duty and destiny to face and defeat the Bane, the greatest mage tyrant the world has ever known. A suicide task for anyone let alone a sixteen-year-old girl with no training, facing a prophecy that foretells a fiery clash to the death.

Prince Titus of Elberon has sworn to protect Iolanthe at all costs but he's also a powerful mage committed to obliterating the Bane to revenge the death of his family—even if he must sacrifice both Iolanthe and himself to achieve his goal.

But Titus makes the terrifying mistake of falling in love with the girl who should have been only a means to an end. Now, with the servants of the Bane closing in, he must choose between his mission and her life.

• ISBN10: 0062207296
• ISBN13: 9780062207296
• Publish Date: 17 September 2013
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Imprint: Collins
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 480
• Language: English

Reviews

[Annie Jackson]

Granted, The Burning Sky reads and feels a bit like a Harry Potter knock off at first. But that prologue!  It's awesome and the story delivers on everything it promises. The characters are feisty and fantastic and the magic of the world keeps things interesting. If you're looking for an entertaining fantasy read that doesn't take itself too seriously than this is a sublime choice.

[Amber (The Literary Phoenix)]

There's a lot of really enjoyable elements to THE BURNING SKY and I love Iolanthe's arc at the end of the book. There's transmogrification and elemental magic and wyverns and magical training grounds and a lot of bits and pieces to this story that make it an enjoyable read.

That said.

Stylistically, the writing is flat and unexciting. The world is developed in a very straightforward way rather than the slower, more gradual blossoming I'm used to in fantasy. I was brought into this world through the action sequences, not through the world building. Additionally, the characters don't develop well. Iolanthe's character growth is convenient and situational. Prince Titus's is more stable at the start of the story, but I don't feel his character really went anywhere in THE BURNING SKY. There were attempts to create a romantic relationship, but they were sloppy at best, as though the romance is being forced upon two incompatible people. Really it just made it awkward.

Regardless, I enjoyed the story itself and the characters as they were. If you're looking for a fantastical work of art, I don't think THE BURNING SKY is it. But in so far as a pure entertainment, THE BURNING SKY has it in spades.

For a more detailed review and other bookish goodies, stop by The Literary Phoenix.

[littleread1]

I really really enjoyed this. It took a bit to sink into the world, but once I did I was stuck there. Moving right along to book 2.

[KitsuneBae]

See review on the third book.

[melanchalina]

Это история о девушке, которая обманула тысячи мальчиков. О юноше, который обманул целую страну. О дружбе, которая изменит судьбы миров. И о силе, что способна бросить вызов величайшему из тиранов.
Ждите чудес.

Очень долго шла у меня эта книга, и всем только приступающим к ее прочтению, желаю терпения. Первая часть книги, хоть и наполнена сотней событий и интересных описаний, похожа на кисель или жвачку, смотря какое сравнение вам больше по душе. Повествование тянется, создается впечатление, что по сюжету прошло несколько дней и даже месяцев, хоть по хронологии все занимает лишь пару дней. Зато вторая часть книги захватывает и не отпускает до самого конца, буквально проглатывается на одном дыхании.

Иоланта Сибурн – величайший стихийный маг своего поколения.

Она способна повелевать Водой.


Огнем.


Землей.


И даже молнией.


Другими словами – она Маг Третьего уровня, не более того. Хотя и Принц Тит и утверждает, что ей также подвластен Воздух (что, как мы понимаем абсолютная правда).

Иоланта с ним не согласна, как и со всеми его убеждениями, что ей предстоит спасти мир от власти таинственного тирана Лиходея.



Если уж говорить начистоту, ей вообще не нравится идея рисковать жизнью ради призрачного шанса на успех.

«Трусиха». Но уж лучше струхнуть, чем умереть.

И хотя обычно я не люблю героев-трусов, я должна сказать, что в данной истории, данном мире… это было ЛОГИЧНО. В какой-то степени, героини слепо бросающиеся в огонь приключений начинают надоедать. Многие ли из нас в жизни рискнут всем, и просто слепо, моментально бросятся спасать мир? НЕТ. Она 16-летняя девушка, ей положено бояться. Ее привычный мир рухнул, опекун арестован, а дороги домой больше не существует. Она не хочет судьбы Спасительницы. Она не хочет взваливать на свои плечи непосильную ношу.

– Так бычок должен охотно идти на бойню лишь потому, что фермер кормил его и предоставил загон? Сколькие из них согласились бы на эту «сделку», если бы знали, что будет в конце? Ты просишь меня отказаться от всего ради дела, ко мне не относящегося. Я не хочу быть звеном революции. Просто хочу жить!
– Жить, так никогда и не попробовав свободы? – глухо спросил принц.
– Мертвой мне будет все равно! – негодующе выпалила Иоланта.

И я полностью с ней согласна. Многие из нас предпочтут призрачную свободу смерти. И также, как автор грамотно выстроил сомнения Иоланты, Шерелин умело подвела ее к осознанию правильности своих поступков.

Если Иоланта окажется в силах свергнуть Лиходея, сможет ли она существовать, так и не попытавшись? Просто сохраняя в безопасности себя и учителя Хейвуда в каком-нибудь уголке Лабиринтных гор, пока миссис Нидлз и бесчисленные ей подобные гниют в тюрьмах Атлантиды?
Сможет ли ужиться с собой, трусихой, пока мир пылает?

Ей страшно, одиноко. Но она находит в себе мужество принять судьбу и сделать мир лучше. Она начинает видеть мир целиком, а не только в разрезе своей жизни.

Но давайте будем честными. В этой книге настоящее сокровище, это Тит. Я с трудом могу припомнить хоть одного такого прекрасно прописанного мужского персонажа. Персонажа, в котором разум побеждает все другие эмоциональные и физические порывы. Любовь любовью, но спасение мира на первом месте. Он не падает к ногам героини, буквально крича «Ах, я так люблю тебя, плевать на все – давай убежим в закат!». Как раз, наоборот, ради будущего он готов пожертвовать своими чувствовали и даже жизнью. Он готов причинять героине боль, подставлять и манипулировать ею, лишь чтобы она стала сильнее. Он готов принести в жертву их двоих, ради спасения миллионов. Много ли таких героев вы знаете?

– Мы не можем, – тихо произнес принц. – Я думал, любовь свяжет нас вместе для достижения цели. И ошибался. Ситуация гораздо сложнее. В тот момент, когда я стану бесполезным, тебе придется оставить меня позади. И это решение нельзя принимать или нет под влиянием ненужных эмоций.

Если говорить о самой книге – герои были чудесны, идея впечатляющая, но прорисовка мира желает лучшего. Тут и там проскальзывали некие магические личности и предметы, но читателям слишком много нужно додумывать и связывать воедино самим, что довольно запутанно и утомительно. Сам мир не блистает оригинальностью, постоянно на ум приходят сравнения с другими творческими произведениями. И давайте уж будем честными, нет никакого сомнения, что Шерилин вдохновлялась «Легендой об Аанге» и «Легендой о Корре». Даже сцена обретения Иолантой власти над Воздухом один в один с ситуацией с Корой в «Легенде».



Еще из минусов, скучающее под конец повествование. В том плане, что вся книга рассказывается от лица героини и героя, но под конец, автор перескакивал слишком быстро. Буквально по предложению от каждого героя. Мой мозг не успевал переключаться.

Все это минусы, хоть и не раздражающие. Я приняла их просто, как факты.

Атлантида тоже не раскрыта. Вероятнее всего автор оставила это на следующие книги серии, но для меня это все слабое оправдание. Либо раскройте мне мир в первой книге, либо просто не делайте его настолько сложным. Плюс к этому, мотивы злодеев совершенно неясны. Нам, опять же, дают лишь общую картину, мол остальное додумайте сами (или ждите продолжения). По факту, нам просто говорят: эти ребята злодеи. Но почему? Каковы из злодеяния? Что такого уж страшного они сделали?

Что в итоге? Книга хорошая. Но она могла бы быть ГОРАЗДО лучше. Сразу видно, это не первая книга у автора (на это указывают герои и шикарная любовная линия), но первое подростковое фэнтези (слабый мир и нераскрытость).

PS: Мне одной ответ на «загадку» про отца Тита кажется слишком очевидным?

Моя оценка: 6,5/10

[Katie King]

**4 stars**

Wow. That's all I can say about this book! Not really...

The Burning Sky begins with the heroine Iolanthe, a young elemental mage, attempting to create the perfect light elixir for a wedding. Let me just take a step back to say that I wish we could bottle moonlight for weddings, because that would be seriously gorgeous. Okay, so Iolanthe gets into a tussle with her mentor, and he ruins the potion. She discovers that lightning can fix the elixir, tries it out, and launches an epic battle for her powers. You see, being able to call lightning is not exactly common, and a hallmark of a great level IV elemental mage. You know, the type that would be able to overthrow the country currently occupying hers. She therefore presents a small problem for them.

In short, I loved Iolanthe. She was bold, funny, clumsy, skilled, smart, feminine, tough, and most importantly real. She was torn between saving herself and helping Titus, the prince. She was torn between helping Titus and rescuing her mentor. She was torn between her duty and desire for a quiet life and her growing feelings for Titus. She wasn't exceptionally beautiful or ugly. She wasn't exceptionally gifted at everything she did, she still made plenty mistakes and struggled with herself. It was very refreshing not to read about everyone fawning all over the female characters.

This story is not just about Iolanthe, but the prince Titus too. Titus needs the foreseen great elemental mage to liberate his country. Iolanthe wants her mentor back and a peaceful life of scholarship. Drawn to Iolanthe out of necessity to overthrow the occupiers, Titus realizes their destinies have been intertwined since before they were born. They band together to save everyone, but little do they realize how they will change each other's lives.

I thought Titus was very sweet. He plays the pompous, spoiled prince role very well, maybe too well to be entirely fake. But not so deep down, he is very caring and fiercely loyal. He tried to act tough with Iolanthe in the beginning, but I could see the facade faltering. I really love them together and thought that their romance seemed genuine, albeit rushed if you actually examine the timespan of the story.

Something I was less than thrilled with was the time spent at Eton. Iolanthe goes into hiding as a male schoolmate of Titus' at Eton, but there seemed to be too much emphasis on the time spent there. In short, I was bored. I get the necessity of her being there, but a significant chunk was Iolanthe playing cricket or socializing or doing homework assignments for others. This could have easily been left out.

Finally, I thought the world was great with one exception. Between Atlantis, Delmar (?), and England, I thought there was a lot of potential for a variety in the story. Instead, a lot of the story actually takes place in a book. This would be fine except I had a very hard time following the events in the last 100 pages. I understand the concept of the Crucible, but understanding where Iolanthe and Titus were at any given point or why they were in a spot or whether it was the Crucible or the real world or what exactly was going on...I was very lost. I thought this was a cool idea, but it had too little explanation for me to follow it.

All in all, a very enjoyable read! The magic was particularly interesting to me, although the rules about who has the ability to perform magic was a little confusing too. The prince can but somehow his magic is different from Iolanthe's?

[lizarodz]

Wow.

Let’s try this again. I’m in love with The Burning Sky, so let me start by giving Andye from Reading Teen a big THANK YOU for pointing out that I would indeed love this book.

I’m a big fan of the Harry Potter series (who isn’t? *I’m looking at you Hannah*), and there is no way to read The Burning Sky without comparing it to that beloved series. Even though they have things in common, for example the mix of fantasy and ‘real world’ and the use of magic, spells, potions, wands, etc. they are unique enough for me to love them both equally. Now that the big elephant in the room has been addressed, let start this review. Shall we?

The setting is very interesting as there are mage and non-mage countries or kingdoms. For instance, Titus is the prince of The Domain, but he is sent to school to Eaton in London in the 1800s (I think). Thus the book is part historical romance and part fantasy. I love the combination of both, the world building is amazing. The Domain has castles, fantastical creatures (like dragons!), a tyrant, a different mode of dress and a different culture, worlds that exist within books, places folded into another dimension, and vaulting. It was all exquisitely thought out and explained in a way that didn’t invite confusion.

“I live for you, and you alone.”

There are two types of “magic”, one that relies in spells and one that is elemental. Elemental magic has fallen out of use and there aren’t many powerful elemental mages. Until Iolanthe came along. Iolanthe has been protected by her guardian all her life, but at the blurb explains “It all began with a ruined elixir and an accidental bolt of lightning”. She is naïve and clueless, but also loyal, intelligent, talented and powerful. She learns quickly what to do in order to survive, even if she has to pretend that she is someone else.

“You can live forever for me.”

Titus is such a complex character. He is certainly one of the favorite characters of all times! He is a prince by birth and had every privilege growing up. At the same time, he’s been isolated, spied on and betrayed more times that he can count. This has made him very cautious and he’s a very good actor in front of others. He is extremely smart, a great mage and an amazing strategist. He is very slow to trust and to show his feelings. Titus’ mother was a seer and she predicted that he would find the prophesied elemental mage and it would be his duty to protect him (hmm… in this case “her”); needless to say, he spends endless hours practicing magic and plans to fulfil what he considers his sacred duty, even if he has to forfeit his own life.

“Now he could work her likeness into any story of his choosing.

Now he could fight dragons for her.

And now he could kiss her again.”

The romance that slowing develops between Iolanthe and Titus is so sweet. There is nothing that Titus won’t do for her, to keep her safe and anticipate her every need. Neither one wants the entanglement and complication of having feelings for each other, but they learn to accept and embrace the inevitable. There is no instant love, no triangle, no clichés.

The Burning Sky has everything you might want in a book, fantasy, romance, adventure, mystery. The writing is incredibly good, easy to read and understand. He world building and characterization is amazing. As you can see, there isn’t much I didn’t love about it!

Overall, The Burning Sky is a must read for fans of fantasy and magic, I already started reading The Perilous Sea and I’m loving it so far!

About the narration: This book was narrated by British actor Phillip Battley. It’s my first book narrated by him and I loved it. I think that his voice and his interpretation made me love Titus even more. I loved his performance!

About the cover: Gorgeous! It shows a fire phoenix over a castle with the mountains in the background. We can see darkness and the turmoil of clouds and lighting. I also love the font of the title.

“He removed his arm from his face and opened his eyes. She was sitting on the carpet before the low table, wearing his gray, hooded tunic, but not his trousers. Her legs were bare below mid-thigh.

The sight jolted him out of his lethargy. “Where are your trousers?”

“They had no braces and won’t stay up. Besides, it’s warm enough in here.”

He was feeling quite hot. It was not unusual to see girls in short robes come summertime in Delamer. But in England skirts always skimmed the ground and men went mad for a glimpse of feminine ankles. So much skin—boys at school would faint from overexcitement.

He might have been a bit unsteady too, if he were not already lying down.

“You never answered my question,” she said, as if the view of long, shapely legs should not scramble his thoughts at all.”

[limabean74]

I really wanted to like this but I think I stuck with it as long as I could. Super bummed but I just wasn't what I was expecting and the pace was just very slow for me. I just wasn't connecting with it like I had hoped I would.

[ladygrey]

I am in love with this book. I need more of this world and more of Titus and Fairfax and the magic and everything. I need questions answered and more adventures and I am so glad this is part of a series.

There are only two criticisms I can fathom for this book. The first is that it is high fantasy that throws you into the midst of a strangle world with strange words (it took me three instances to get vaulting) but it's a great world and I did adapt within the first chapter or two. There was something about the magic and the tone of everything that had a decidedly Harry Potter feel to it. There's a whole breadth of magic in this world which is great.
Oh, and I could have done without the footnotes. They were fun information and I'm glad the explanations didn't clutter up the text but I didn't love them. But they don't count as a flaw. Just a peculiarity.
The other minor flaw is that it isn't really a compelling book. The first page is brilliant and intriguing but saps a lot of tension from later moments because she's already told you some of what's going to happen. But the advisory to expect magic is awesome.

And even though it was an easy book to put down it also was just begging to be reread. Scenes and lines that I immediately wanted to revisit and characters that are so well developed and so... I don't know... amazing. Iolanthe is a great heroine, scared and tough and honest and funny and pretty and smart and adaptable. I really liked her. And Titus is so strong... his will is like iron and it's so fierce and so unflinching it's beautiful. And he's such a gentleman in the quiet moments and such a guy in the funny ones. I adored them together and that their relationship was both a slow burn romance and a very good, very important friendship.

And there's action and there's awesome and unpredictable magic. This would be such an amazing movie. I want to reread it all over again right now.

[jnikkir]

This review can also be found at my blog, There were books involved...

-----------------------------

How to describe The Burning Sky...? This is a tough one, so I'll use an awful metaphor. The best way I can describe this book is like... if you took Harry Potter, some YA epic fantasy, and some animated Disney movies like Mulan and Sleeping Beauty; then randomly pulled out sections (or scenes from the movies) of varying length, and shuffled them all together and covered the resulting pages in extremely sparkly glitter.

Does that sound mystifyingly entertaining? Yes! Shiny and happy-making? Yes! Does it also sound confusing and like it might be a little bit of a mess? ...Yes.

The Burning Sky was a book I purchased pretty much immediately upon finding out that it employs one of my favorite scenarios ever - the whole "girl masquerades as boy in order to hide / do something she might otherwise not be able to do as a girl" kind of thing. Basically, give me a book where a girl has to disguise herself as a boy for some reason, and I am so there. The potential humor of the situation is great, but the main reason I love this is because it usually gives the girl a chance to kick some butt, and when the boys eventually find out that she's not One Of Them, maybe it challenges their view of how capable women really are.

Anyway, luckily, I loved how this was written in The Burning Sky. It was a little different than the norm, as Titus knows all along that Iolanthe is a girl. But she is undercover at an all-boys school, so of course she has to fool all her classmates, which is entertaining (as these things are). Iolanthe succeeds spectacularly at convincing everyone that she's a boy. Granted, she has some help thanks to this spell that Titus set up before she got to the school, creating an idea of Archer Fairfax, who everyone at school is convinced exists even before Iolanthe shows up to fill that role. But Iolanthe is also hilariously awesome at being the quintessential British schoolboy, which is highly entertaining. She shows the other boys how it's done. And that whole scenario was actually my favorite thing about The Burning Sky.

The plot itself was pretty good, too, and the relationship between Iolanthe and Titus was great. Iolanthe is on the run because she possesses a level of magical power that hasn't been seen in a very long time, and an evil mage, the Bane, wants to catch her in order to gain those powers for himself. Titus, the prince of his realm, wants the Bane dead for his own reasons, and he needs Iolanthe to help him get revenge on the evil mage. So he saves her from imminent danger, and helps her learn to harness her powers so eventually they can both go after the mage and defeat him. Their time together for the majority of the book is exciting and fun. And the relationship between Iolanthe and Titus (since it starts out as basically Titus kidnapping her for her own safety) goes from complete dislike, to grudging partnership, to respect and friendship, before it goes anywhere near actual relationship territory. It was adorable and often funny and totally I-just-want-to-smoosh-their-faces-together cute.

However... there is one major issue I had with The Burning Sky, which didn't have anything to do with the characters -- but rather, with the worldbuilding: I feel like this book gave off a vibe of simplicity, but the worldbuilding it attempted was anything but. The characters and plot and setting seemed almost appropriate for a borderline middle-grade book, or at least "younger" YA. But all the details of the magic systems, and the way everything is explained, just felt like they didn't really pair well with that.

First off all, the book is chock full of endnotes (yes, like footnotes, except you have to flip to the back of the book to find them), which totally do not fit with the simplistic approach to the storytelling or quirky characters. They're written in a more scholarly manner, like excerpts from historical texts or somesuch, and they are long. And unfortunately, I found them to be extremely annoying. They pulled me out of the story every single time I hit one. I dreaded coming across these things! And while they did explain a lot, I feel like endnotes were not the right way to go about this kind of explanation.

In addition to the endnotes, the in-story worldbuilding was confusing as all get-out. Or maybe "confusing" isn't the right word... more like super busy. There are just soooo many things going on.

• First, there are multiple "mage realms". I'm still not sure whether they're actually separate universes, or if they're located in one alternate universe to Earth and are just geographically distinct locations. There is much confusing travel between them (see below).

• There are multiple modes of magical travel. You can "vault", which is basically Harry Potter's apparition, except it's apparently really hard and each mage has a range-limit, except they can take supplements to help them overcome those limits... Oh and you can do side-along apparition--I mean vaulting, as well. There are also a whole bunch of portals that can be traveled through by train, or by flying horse(or other animal)-drawn carriage, or portals that are hidden in things like trunks and closets. These are fine all on their own, but when you have the characters using one and then the other and then another and--oh just go with it, they eventually traveled from point A to point B and it was all very confusing. Moving on.

• There's also a storybook that you can travel into, filled with legends like Sleeping Beauty, where you battle a monster and "win" by saving the princess. Like a magical computer game, except it's a book, and it's actually real. Except you can't die in it. ...Except when you can.

• Places like Atlantis and other fairy tale elements are used totally differently from what we're familiar with in our own fairy tales, because apparently the "real world" has built up legends around these names, but we got the stories totally wrong. This just served to confuse me as to why these names were used in the first place, instead of just making up a totally original name.

• And top it all off with two different types of magic, elemental magic and subtle magic. Elemental magic is older and grander, but subtle magic is more widely used in the story, being easier(?) and basically just more practical. I think.

For the record, I'm not usually one to complain when something is confusing -- I'm not an unintelligent person, and I love detailed worldbuilding that's organic and sensible. But while little details are always needed to add depth to a world, this level of apparent randomness wasn't enjoyable for me. Cohesion is key. I feel like this could have been a more successful world if 70% of the magical extras were either removed or just changed somehow. Why throw in a city called Atlantis if it has nothing to do with the mythical lost city? Why include two separate magical systems when they could have been condensed and simplified into one? Why include all these different mage realms when it could have been one clearly distinct "magical" alternate universe, with some kind of portal to our "nonmagical" world? (Maybe this was actually the case? But if it was, I certainly missed that explanation.) So much could've been pared down. And I mean, I could tell that all these elements were mean to be Super Fun -- but all thrown together, it was a bit too much.

 

In conclusion...

If you're not averse to living in a constant state of bafflement while reading about actually pretty great characters, then this might be a more appealing book to you than it was for me. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's highly entertaining, and fast-paced enough once you get through the first couple chapters. Titus and Iolanthe are great together at the boarding school, as they try to make sure that Iolanthe doesn't reveal herself to be a girl, and their relationship is sweet and progresses at a really good pace. Unfortunately, the worldbuilding did not live up to my expectations, to put it mildly. I'm not sure how I feel about this being a series -- I loved Titus and Iolanthe, but I'm not sure if I'll end up liking the sequel if I have the same issues with it, as I did with this first installment. So I'm crossing my fingers that my issues aren't issues in the sequel, because I really would like to see more of Titus and Iolanthe!