Fourth Wing, Iron Flame
2.0 Stars
6-16-2024

"“Young Adult 18+ Mature Themes” is how the bookstore designates books that are pretty simple, reading-level wise, but also have hardcore porn in them that children absolutely should not read. This is where most of Ariel’s favorite books reside." - Silicon Age Collapse document

So, this was my first BookTok read, and despite (because of?) the absolutely stellar GoodReads reviews it was a pretty big disappointment. The core problem with the book is that it has too much basic Yin energy, i.e. the main character is very very special, and she gets the best dragon, and then the other best dragon, and the best powers, and the best boyfriend, and he has 8 pack abs and he's also in charge of everything because he's super cool but he's also rebellious and dangerous but also he's royalty and also and also and also and also. For a bit there at the start it seems like there's going to be a love triangle where she has to choose between straight-and-narraow Dain and bad-but-cool Zain, but that gets thrown out the window pretty quickly and then the rest of the book is spent shitting all over Dain. Get fucked Dain, you're dog shit, cucks like you should be executed. Is the message of the book. The best I can say about this is that it makes me feel better about male fantasies, which are really quite upright and decent and original in comparison. Oh right, and then like 75% of the way through the book starts introducing words like "clit" and "armoire", which are not at all appropriate for this book's age group. Hmm, what else. The OC is very special and she can throw lightning bolts with her mind, and lightning is one of the very few things that can hurt the Big Bad that is threatening the world, but she is just too focused on you-know-what to ever actually spend any time mastering this stuff. I can just feel Raistlin rolling over in his grave. Oh right and there's exactly one chapter from the the male lead's perspective, and it is just heartbreaking. Does the author really think that men think this way? Does the author really think that women want men to think this way? Again, heartbreaking.

Was there anything positive? I liked that the author decided to give the characters both dragons and X-men powers. Like, it's fantasy, if you decide you want to go whole hog with your universe there's no real boundary or governing body that can stop you. I know I complained about all the gifts given to the main character, but I'm weirdly OK with this sort of overload when it comes to world building. Like it's not going to be great art, but it might still result in a fun book. I also liked the unreasonable effectiveness of lassos in aerial combat; there's basically nothing a weapon or spell can do that's worse than being pulled off your ride and slammed into the ground at several hundred miles per hour. Also kind of funny the mental image of these wizards yoinking each other off of their respective dragons.

Edit: Ok, I have since learned that BookTok does not refer to "people on TikTok that like books" but rather "horny people on TikTok that like books". So that explains the disconnect between what I expected and what I got with this book.