The third and final installment of The Empyrean trilogy, “Onyx Storm,” by Rebecca Yarros releases January 21, and in preparation I’ve read and reviewed the first two books of the series.
I’ll cut to the chase: they’re terrible, but somehow still worth the read.
In the fantasy land of Navarre, where every landmark has a vaguely Scottish name, students at the only war college fight one another to bond with dragons. The college is like West Point meets “How to Train Your Dragon.”
The dragons have joined the riders to fight off other threatening winged creatures at the borders of Navarre, yet we don’t see any of these so-called battles until the last 50 pages of the first book. The stakes were so low that I kept reading just to see when, exactly, Yarros would let me down.
The first book, “Fourth Wing,” follows Violet Sorrengail, daughter of General Sorrengail as she tries to survive her first year at the war college where everyone’s goal is to kill one another. The first book is over 500 pages and long story short: she doesn’t die. In a college that trains brutal dragon-riding soldiers, I was never once overly worried that she was going to perish.
Violet Sorrengail’s character was a missed opportunity. It’s not often we get a female protagonist with a chronic illness who doesn’t become cured, yet succeeds on her own. But Violet has plot armor full of holes because her illness – very loosely based on Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome – is forgotten halfway through the novel and isn’t brought back up til the end.
Healers and medics simply heal her and wrap her joints up and Yarros sends her on her merry way, along with a custom saddle. Cue a few references to her working out at a fantasy Planet Fitness and Violet is ready to spar and take down men twice her size. And when she can’t, she conveniently poisons each opponent. We could have had a realistic character who struggles and doesn’t always succeed, but somehow she prevails. It’s as predictable and one-dimensional as the friendships she makes.
Now this wouldn’t be a review of The Empyrean Trilogy without mentioning the male lead, Xaden Riorson, the son of an executed rebellion leader. This character was so forgettable that I had to look him up multiple times because I couldn’t remember anything about him besides the fact that his name started with a letter it shouldn’t have.
He’s the perfect example of the stock male lead every author uses in their romantic fantasy novel; a dark and brooding man who will protect the female protagonist at any cost for unknown reasons. But there is little else to his character other than the fact that he carries a lot of knives and has been dubbed the uncomfortable name of “shadow daddy” by fans of the character for his power to wield shadows.
Xaden and Violet are meant to be two characters diametrically opposed because their parents were on opposite sides of a mysterious rebellion that is quickly glossed over in “Fourth Wing,” but Yarros fails to craft a compelling “enemies to lovers” trope. The sexual tension between these characters is forced and dare I say predictable, leaving me wondering how they ever became attracted to one another in the first place.
When the two characters do eventually consummate their half-hearted sexual attraction, the scenes were so gratuitous that I felt like I was cheating on my partner just reading it. The two characters’ chemistry was supplemented with supernatural elements, including some poorly timed lightning, resulting in a romance that lacked intimacy.
Despite all of this, I kept reading. And I will concede, the ending of “Fourth Wing” was surprising, engaging and somewhat heartbreaking.
And then “Iron Flame” destroyed all of that emotional depth.
While the death and rebirth of a few choice characters could have focused the narrative of “Iron Flame,” Yarros chose to make Violet and Xaden’s relationship problems front and center while their world was falling apart around them.
I could care less that Xaden had a girlfriend before Violet, that’s not very out of the ordinary, and besides that, there is a war going on. Yarros built up this unique magic system where dragons have a distinct character and voice, but she chose to center the narrative on the various ways the two main characters disappoint each other in their dating life.
I think “Iron Flame” as a whole was a missed opportunity. If Yarros had chosen to sideline the romantic plot to a subplot narrative, she would have had more room to continue building the political and fantastical plot that drove the main narrative.
Instead, the interesting parts of this fantasy world were cast off for another heterosexual relationship between characters who barely had any chemistry. The urgency of war felt like a backdrop for the lacking romance, and I think that Yarros prioritized the wrong plot.
I also can’t get over the dialogue. The words, “We are endgame” coming from a supposedly composed, brooding and intelligent man can’t be described in any other word than cringy. No one talks like that.
You could be wondering, “MJ, if you hate this series so much, why did you even bother reading almost 1,200 pages of smut?” I wasted my time on these books because they were a fun read. The Empyrean series isn’t some literary genius to be studied in a classroom, but I had fun going on this journey with wildly unbelievable characters and their sassy dragons.
It’s good to read something that challenges your literary taste, and this was definitely a challenge. I wouldn’t have picked up the series if it wasn’t a gift, but I’m glad I tried something new.
If you want a literary adventure that is intellectually challenging, emotional and a world based on fantasy of a higher caliber, I would recommend the Poppy War series by R.F. Kuang.
When “Onyx Storm” soon releases I’ll be buying it, both to see how the series ends and because I need more fun and torturous books like this series to read.