Fire (Graceling Realm, #2)

by Kristin Cashore

[nannah]

Thinking of Fire as a standalone with no connection to Graceling . . . I love it! When I try to connect it to Graceling, I'm confused and more irritated than anything . . .

Book content warnings:
animal torture
rape
sexual harassment
gendered slurs
suicide

This was so different from Graceling in so many ways. In my opinion, it was a change from night to day, in the best possible way. Instead of even taking place in the "Graceling Realm", this novel takes place in an entire different world, with different rules, royalty, and political systems. Most of all, the writing is like someone either ran in to take Kristin Cashore's place, or some amazing editor came in and reworked all of Kristin Cashore's stilted dialogue and awkward sentences. There was great flow!

What I loved:

The improved dialogue and prose. It's so much more natural. I actually feel for the characters, and I was looking forward to seeing what happens to them. I loved the chemistry between the main two, and the female characters really stood out on their own. Again, if I hadn't known this was supposed to be a companion to Graceling, I wouldn't have connected the two at all. And knowing my opinion on that one, that's . . . a good thing.

What I didn't like:

So this book takes place in an entire other world than the first book. And it STILL isn't a place for any POC or LGBT people (except in a mention). That's disappointing, to say the least. And WHY did she want to create a story for young adults with so much gross sexual harassment and rape? The names are also very similar to Katsa's world (Nash, Musa, Po, Leck, etc.). All shows a lack of creativity. Speaking of, the "monsters" also reveal lack of creativity, as they're all "raptor monsters", "bug monsters", "mouse monsters". I guess it might be fine for some readers but it just feels unfleshed to me?

I feel like Kristin Cashore tried to portray Cansrel with bipolar disorder. I mean, "periods of rage and melancholy"? That's pretty specific - and pretty negative rep, because though he had a complicated relationship with the protagonist, his daughter, he's not a very good character. As a bipolar person, I'm kind of upset; we're always painted as the bad guys, or in this hard to deal with, unstable light.

The worldbuilding seems a little lacking, especially when it comes to these monsters. "Predator monsters tended to overlook the charms of a face and a body if they saw no interesting hair . . ." Does this mean it's all in the hair? The rules of these monsters confuse me, and nothing's well defined.

But overall, I did enjoy reading this, despite some flaws. It was so much improved from the first installment that I still can't believe their from the same trilogy!