lou's library

Approximately two and a half years (it might be more, I have lost all sense of time) ago, the book world changed forever as everyone and their cat started swooning over dragons, a boy called Xaden and the romantasy hype reached new heights with Fourth Wing. My friends read it and loved it, but I was deep down a Sarah J. Maas rabbit hole at the time, and once I had come back up for air I felt I needed a little break from the genre. Fast forward to a week ago, and I still hadn’t read the biggest book on Booktok, and in every book shop I entered. Fourth Wing was impossible to escape, and yet I had somehow accidentally managed to. But then I got sick of the copy my friend had lent me staring at me accusingly, and started reading it with honestly pretty low expectations. Come along for the ride, why don’t you (there are spoilers ahead, in case you have managed to somehow escape this book too)?

Going into Fourth Wing, all I knew was that the male protagonist everyone was swooning over had a name that started with X, that dragons were an important part of the plot and I was pretty sure I had overheard my sister and our friend talk about dragon sex, which I did not like the sound of. That was it and it honestly wasn’t making me too hopeful. I have this weird thing against dragons. I’ve never liked them (@ any dragons reading this, it’s not you, it’s me, so please don’t take it personally) without being able to say why, and I’m sure that’s part of the reason why it took me so long to read Fourth Wing. As a kid, everyone but me loved Eragon, while I just didn’t vibe with it. But because I’m an open-minded grown up, I vowed not to let my antipathy stop me from giving this book a fair chance, so I started reading anyway.

The first couple hundred of pages were enjoyable enough, but they didn’t suck me in, which I was surprised about, because another thing I knew about Fourth Wing was how utterly addictive everyone thought it was. That being said, while I wasn’t hooked yet, I was having a good time. The school setting is one I will always be here for, and the ‘almost getting killed a hundred times while trying to survive the first year’ of it all reminded me a lot of Divergent, which is a compliment, of course.

Now, because I’m a sucker for soft-spoken, kind, protective fictional men, I was sending big heart eyes at Dain, Violet’s best friend. But because his name doesn’t start with an X, I knew I was setting myself up for misery, and that he most likely would not be the main love interest. Love triangles are something I am considerably less interested in at twenty-eight than I was at twelve (#TeamEdward forever and always), so I was slightly annoyed at the prospect of Violet struggling to decide between Dain and Xaden. I also really did not want to be on team Dain only for her to go and run off with Xaden, that would not have been fun (I do feel sorry for all the #TeamJacob girlies to this day).

Luckily, that problem solved itself as Dain became ever more annoyingly overprotective. Honestly, that guy behaved as though she was incapable of tying her own shoelaces. No thank you, very unattractive of you, please go piss off. Little did I know that my slight antipathy would turn into full on hatred over the next couple hundred of pages and that by the end of the book, I would be wishing for Dain’s death (fantasy books truly bring out the best in me). If that ain’t the joy of fast-paced fantasy books then I don’t know what is.

But I’m getting ahead of myself a little here. Somewhere around the halfway point, I switched from enjoying Fourth Wing to thinking about it nonstop whenever I wasn’t reading, which naturally resulted in me doing nothing but read. I was also getting around to Xaden, who I had been mildly lukewarm about thus far. I will say that the whole ‘bad guy who is very secretive but actually a really decent guy’ thing would be getting a little old by now if I didn’t eat it up every! single! time! I do wish that we had been given a little more reason to like Xaden, though. Yes, he helps Violet, and believes in her and her abilities, but we know so little about him as a person that I sometimes struggled to understand why Violet fell for him (other than for his immaculate looks, of course). Also, the enemy to lovers dynamic between them fell a little flat for me, as I did not once believe Xaden to be her enemy. Yes, he said he wanted to kill her, but none of his actions matched his words. Even worse, from almost the very start, he continuously helped her, so I would argue these two have never been enemies.

All that being said, of course I still rooted for them like an absolute lunatic, because I am a simple girl. In terms of plot, I was really enjoying the school setting and all the trials they had to survive, but during the last couple of hundred pages, it all fell apart a bit in my opinion. All the big hurdles had been passed and I wasn’t sure what we were striving towards now. Just surviving until the end of the school year? Of course, seventy pages from the end shit started to hit the fan, and my God, did it break my heart when Liam died. I was pretty sure either he or Rhiannon would have to kick the bucket, and even though I love Rhiannon, I would have thrown her off a cliff myself in a second to save Liam. Rebecca Yarros knew exactly what she was doing by writing the sweetest, funniest, and kindest character and then having him die in the final battle. I saw it coming by a mile and it still hit me like a truck. I don’t think I will ever be able to forgive her for doing that to me. HE WAS SO PURE AND INNOCENT.

Okay, deep breaths. Surprisingly, I did not mind the dragons at all (apart from the dragon sex connection, truly unnecessary!!!). I even enjoyed having them around at times, which surely is a sign of my ability to grow as a person and continuously work on myself. That being said, I also would have been fine with them not being there, you know? I just don’t think they added all that much to the story, but I am sure there are people who think dragon riders are incredibly hot, and so for their sake, I am happy for the dragons to stay around.

It’s safe to say that Fourth Wing made me incapable of doing anything other than read for the second half of the book, although not to the same extent as A Court of Mist and Fury. That obsession will forever remain unmatched, I fear. Still, I really appreciate Fourth Wing having a female protagonist who is not as big or strong as her opponents, without it meaning that she is incapable of defending herself. Her weaknesses don’t end up defining her, and she also doesn’t miraculously overcome them to match the standard. That’s rare in fantasy books and I really enjoyed seeing Violet come into her own in a way that felt authentic, exciting and realistic.

Considering I went into Fourth Wing with pretty low expectations, I was very much pleasantly surprised. Yes, I had heard a lot of praise for the book, but I had also heard a lot of people dismiss it as dragon smut or lowbrow entertainment, but I am here to tell you that entertained I was, and that was the main goal! I got sucked into that world and am so glad I finally gave this book a chance. I’m so late to this party it cannot even be called fashionable, but I’m ever so glad to have made it here eventually. Although I do think I will give books two and three a miss, after the rather mixed reviews I have heard so far. Unless someone wants to convince me otherwise, of course. I’m all ears.