The Burning Sky (Elemental Trilogy, #1)

by Sherry Thomas

[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.