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81 of 83 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Even better than Graceling!, October 5, 2009
This review is from: Fire (Graceling) (Hardcover)
Fire is an outcast in her society, her vibrant and unnatural hair color an indicator of her monster status and her dangerous powers of mind control. She's the only one left of her kind, and she resides far out in the country where she is safe from those who fear her and would harm her.
Meanwhile, King Nash is struggling to hold on to his kingdom as enemies from the north and south threaten to overthrow him. Both Nash and his brother Brigan distrust Fire for the havoc her father wreaked on the kingdom before his death, and Brigan would like nothing more than for Fire to be killed. But now, unless they find a way to resolve their differences and work together, they'll never win the impending war.
In this prequel to Graceling, Kristin Cashore has woven an intricate and brilliant tale that reveals a whole new world beyond Katsa's seven lands, full of fantastic creatures, strange powers, and a land teeming with political tension. For the most part, the characters in Fire are made more mature than Graceling's protagonists by the complexities of their past. Fire is a strong heroine, tough and fiercely independent, but loyal and kind through and through. She is genuinely thoughtful, and her concern for others stands out, especially as she struggles to reconcile her own nature and her father's actions with who she wishes to be.
The beginning of the book is slightly slow, but in no time at all it speeds up as Fire is launched out of her comfortable world and into an unknown and dangerous one. Cashore's plot is wonderfully complex and elaborate, but tight and solid. Fire also deals with many emotions--guilt, regret, fear, love, and empathy--in a very affecting way. Cashore is a master at using all of these elements to create a suspenseful, surprising, and totally engaging read. Though Fire is not a happy, warm book all of the time--it deals with death and violence and life's cruelties, but in a sensitive and optimistic manner, it has its moments of humor and romance. Cashore's talent for pulling off such an epic and engrossing read makes her one of the best YA fantasy writers since Tamora Pierce first introduced her character Alanna to the world. If readers weren't already in love with Cashore after reading Graceling, they will be after reading Fire.
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52 of 55 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
If Kristin Cashore released a book every day I'd never leave my house., October 5, 2009
This review is from: Fire (Graceling) (Hardcover)
Gosh, FIRE is a fantastic. Before I read it, I would have insisted that anyone who thought FIRE was better than GRACELING had to be crazy, because how do you improve on perfection? So instead I will say that FIRE is equally good, while being a very different book.
FIRE takes place in the same world as GRACELING, but there is little crossover. It's a prequel, set at least a decade before GRACELING, and only one character appears in both books. The two can be read in any order.
The story takes place in the Dells, where there are monsters but no gracelings. Monster horses, monster mice, monster leopards, monster versions of every species - including people. The monsters are identified by their vivid coloring - "A dappled grey horse in the Dells was a horse. A sunset orange horse was a monster." - and they are so beautiful that onlookers, mesmerized, simply offer themselves up as prey. Mesmerizing beauty is a dangerous enough quality in a predatory animal - in a monster person, it is inevitably wedded to powers of mind control. Two years before FIRE begins, the Dells were nearly destroyed by a monster human, Cansrel, who used his political influence to bring the country to the brink of war.
Fire, the heroine, is Cansrel's daughter. The only living monster human in the Dells, at seventeen she is burdened by a terrible fear that she is evil like her father, and profound guilt because of his misdeeds. She hides her beauty, which drives other humans insane with desire, lives in an isolated corner of the kingdom, and uses her powers of mind-control as rarely as possible. Fire's closest friend and sometime lover, Archer, thinks she is only safe when alone in a room, behind stone walls. But Fire doesn't think that's much of a life, and when Prince Brigan arrives at her homestead with a request for aid, Fire agrees to journey to the capital to interview a spy caught in the palace. Brigan is deeply suspicious of Fire - he knew Cansrel, and is sure the apple cannot have fallen far from the tree - and Fire soon discovers that any aid she might offer to the King will probably violate the careful ethics she has cultivated her whole life. To do good, she must do harm.
It's a complicated, layered plot and I won't say any more about it. The characters are amazing, in their complexity and intensity and believability, and the writing is gorgeous. FIRE (and GRACELING) are fantastic books - they will satisfy young readers and adult readers alike, they will satisfy picky readers and readers just looking to be swept away into a marvelous fantasy. They will satisfy readers who like adventure, intrigue, and romance. The characters - even the villains - are interesting, intelligent people; and the twists and turns of the plot are unpredictable.
Highly, highly recommended - read this book!
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39 of 42 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Fire left me a little cold, January 1, 2010
This review is from: Fire (Graceling) (Hardcover)
While our protagonist Fire is fairly diffrent from Kasta in Graceling, her storyline felt a bit recycled. Both heroines leave home on perilous journeys, both grossly misinterpret and underestimate their powers/talents, and both fall in love with princes despite the other men in their lives who are, of course, madly in love with them (and there's never any doubt in the readers mind who the girls will end up with). Another similarity that waxed on my nerves throughout this story was the author's apparent hate for any kind of conventional relationship, i.e. marriage and children born to married people. It seemed that every character in Fire was either illegitimate or a product of rape.
I could handle it in Graceling. I thought, okay, okay, that's just Kasta's character. But in Fire the totally irrisponsible bed-hopping and random pregnancies ceased being annoying and entered the realm of disturbing. Girl power is a clear theme in both novels, but the immature and hormone-driven behavior of the females in Fire is the exact opposite of that. And speaking of gratuitous sex...while the scenes aren't graphic, they felt irrelvent to the plot, especially considering that Fire isn't nearly as romantic as Graceling. One of the things that kept me engaged in Graceling was Po, Kasta's love interest. He's unique for a heartthrob, and we end up falling for him right along with Kasta. In this story, however, I really wanted to like Prince Brigan, but felt I was hardly given the chance. His and Fire's interactions were always infuriatingly short and failed to get to the heart of anything. I understand that Fire is supposed to be a balance between and adventure and romance--I appricate that, even. But the adventure was so bogged down with politics and the romance so lacking of, well, romance, that I couldn't fully enjoy either aspect.
On a positive end note, Cashore can spin a good tale; Graceling, her debut novel, is a good read. I gave Fire three stars because Cashore is a talented writer and a fresh voice in a world of predictable YA fiction. Kudos for that. But while I will most likely buy her next book, it will be because of the potential I saw in Grancling, not Fire, which just didn't live up to it's name for me.
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