Fireborne

Rosaria Munda

Oct 2019 · THE AURELIAN CYCLE Book 1 · Sold by Penguin

About this ebook

"One of fantasy’s best series." —Booklist, starred review

Game of Thrones meets Fourth Wing in a debut young adult fantasy that's full of rivalry, romance . . . and dragons.

Annie and Lee were just children when a brutal revolution changed their world, giving everyone—even the lowborn—a chance to test into the governing class of dragonriders.

Now they are both rising stars in the new regime, despite backgrounds that couldn't be more different. Annie's lowborn family was executed by dragonfire, while Lee's aristocratic family was murdered by revolutionaries. Growing up in the same orphanage forged their friendship, and seven years of training have made them rivals for the top position in the dragonriding fleet.

But everything changes when survivors from the old regime surface, bent on reclaiming the city.

With war on the horizon and his relationship with Annie changing fast, Lee must choose to kill the only family he has left or to betray everything he's come to believe in. And Annie must decide whether to protect the boy she loves . . . or step up to be the champion her city needs.

From debut author Rosaria Munda comes a gripping adventure that calls into question which matters most: the family you were born into, or the one you've chosen.

Ratings and reviews

I’m going to start out this post by letting it be known by all and sundry that I was provided with a physical finished copy of Fireborne from the publisher for publicity posting and a digital review copy from the publisher via Netgalley and FFBC in exchange for an open and honest review. I’m way too opinionated for this to sway me but the FTC requires me to make this sort of thing known. Now, on to the good stuff! I enjoyed reading Fireborne for the most part, I mean, who doesn’t love the idea of riding dragons? But y’all, I have hated Plato for nearly a quarter of a century now and Fireborne screamed its ties to Plato so loudly the entire time I was reading the book. I spent half the time reading the book muttering ”I freaking hate Plato”. I thoroughly applaud Ms Munda though, if Fireborne wasn’t so well-written, I wouldn’t have made it through the book and I would have taken a while to make the connection to Plato. The world-building in Fireborne is hardcore and so in-depth that you can practically see the story taking place around you. There are so many characters that climb out of the book and act out the story for you. That being said, there’s more to Fireborne than my distaste of Plato. There is romance and subterfuge, betrayal and heartache, competition and political turmoil. Fireborne centres around Lee sur Pallor and Antigone sur Aela, two orphans brought together as small children in an orphanage who grow up together, closer and closer, knowing that their pasts are twisted round each other in a choking knot. They’re now teens and facing each other in a contest for position as First Rider in the new regime’s dragonrider corps. As with all teens, there are hormones running amok and tempers getting out of hand left and right, and oh yeah, family acting out in the wings killing people and loyalties being called into question. For the most part, I’m a fan, but the love polyhedron thing? Not really. I want to throw Crissa off a dragon mid-flight because chicks before…. you know where I’m going with that. And I still haven’t figured out Power. Duck annoys me, he’s like an untrained dog you’re worried is going to lift his leg and pee on Annie to mark his territory half the time. Get the girl a clicker. But these are kids being trained for battle and serving their people, what else do you expect but messed up kids? I’m still not sure about where I stand on continuing this series, but I do know that this was a 4-star read. Weird, right? But I can’t discount the storyline or the writing, I may be angsty over whether or not I personally like the story, but I do know when an author’s done an amazing job. Despite the Plato. This has been a review from Once Upon a Time, I Read a Book (dot-com), you can find more quirky reviews and bookish love on my site!

I'm a huge young adult fantasy fan and have been gobbling up more and more fantasy books this year, especially those with dragons. This world building in this book is imaginative and rich in depth as if I were there myself. The plot twists and turns surprised and delighted me and kept me reading. The characters were well-drawn and each had flaws. The author gave them immense growth arcs that I enjoyed and felt satisfied and not cheated with stereotypical cut outs or coincidences to move the plot along. I felt at times that the pacing was too slow and hopefully now that the war for a new political regime has begun, book two's pace will be gripping. I needed more at the end--the ending was too abrupt for me as I was hoping to see more of the battle between the two factions. I also wish more of the dragon and rider bonding and choosing parts of this fantasy world had gone into more depth. The dragons needed distinct personalities and these needed to be shown, especially in how they could have impacted their bonded humans. Overall, I am happy I chose to snag a copy and will be looking forward to book two.

Let me start by saying that I had really high expectations for this book. Dragons, tournaments, war and some romance. Sounds like the perfect book that I would easily love. That wasn't the case. It was a struggle for me getting through the first half of this book. 200 pages is A LOT of pages to not love what you are reading. I had to restart the book three times before I realized it's not my lack of focus that's the problem. The story is all over the place, and I had no idea suddenly what was happening or how we got from one thing to the next. You know that feeling when you are the only one in a group of 10 people that didn't go to the same high school or work at the same café in college and you are all hanging out together? Everyone has all of these inside jokes and stories, and you never know what anyone is talking about or who they were talking about. Well, that was me reading this book. The character development was non-existent, the world building was MIA, and it felt like Nothing. Ever. Happened. Even the dragons were tossed in… talk about a wasted opportunity to really make this book stand out. When I was almost exactly halfway through the book and contemplating if I really wanted to continue reading (it was painful at this point), I gave it one more shot. Suddenly things started making sense and I quickly fell into the rest of the story. Give it time if you aren't feeling it, it does grow on you. While the story did lack that wow factor, and the ending was a little rushed, I couldn't help wondering what's next. Will I pick up the next book in the series? Sure. While I am not sold on these characters and their story, I feel like the second book has a lot of potential and all of the boring build-up will suddenly become something incredible.

About the author

Rosaria Munda grew up in rural North Carolina, studied political theory at Princeton, and lives with her husband in Chicago. She is the author of The Aurelian Cycle, a young adult trilogy that begins with Fireborne.