I’d like to start this review by saying that discovering Penn Cole’s Kindred’s Curse Saga and reading the first two books in the series: (Book #1: Spark of the Everflame) and (Book #2: Glow of the Everflame) was honestly one of the biggest highlights of my year, both reading-wise, and my life in general last year. I LOVED Spark of the Everflame so much that I basically dived into reading Glow of the Everflame right away without taking the time to review Spark of the Everflame. I had a lot going on in my life soon after I finished reading Glow of the Everflame, so I never got the chance to write a review for the book while the details were still fresh in my mind. That being said, I’m definitely planning on going back and reading the first two books in the Kindred’s Curse Saga again at some point in the future, so that I can review them. It’s a pretty rare situation where I’ll marathon a series of relatively long fantasy books like the first two books in the Kindred’s Curse Saga right away; however, I just thought that Spark of the Everflame was so good and it sucked me into the point, but at the time, I couldn’t help but read Glow of the Everflame right away. That being said, here are my thoughts on Heat of the Everflame.
One of the first major strengths of both Heat of the Everflame and the Kindred’s Curse Saga series as a whole is, of course, the writing for the characters. Diem is a fantastic protagonist. Luther serves as a great love interest for Diem and a well-written character as a whole. The fact that Luther was a well-written love interest is definitely essential, since this book, and the Kindred’s Curse Saga as a whole, is considered a romantasy. Plus, Diem and Luther have definitely had amazing chemistry with each other right from the beginning of the series.
The political intrigue is another element of Heat of the Everflame that was executed very well by Cole, and it was an aspect of the book that I really enjoyed. It was exciting to see Diem and the other characters work together to have Diem’s coronation as the Queen of Lumnos legitimatized and deal with the obstacles that Diem faced along the way together throughout the course of the book. The part of the book where Diem and the other characters stayed with the queen of Umbros, Yrselle, was definitely one of the parts of the book that stands out as my favorite for a lot of reasons. I loved Queen Yrselle as a character, and I thought that she was very well written, especially since she had a villainous nature to her. Plus, I felt like that was one of the parts of the books that really helped illustrate some of the larger themes of the book, such as the implications of power and duty by having Diem and the other characters being forced to give up their weapons during that portion of the book, and Yrselle questioning Diem about who she would save in a crisis when the group was playing a dinner party discussion game.
The romance between Diem and Luther is, of course, one of the biggest strengths and selling points of this book, especially since it’s considered a romantasy, and I thought that Cole handled the overall romance aspect of the book very well. That being said, I have to admit that I was definitely a little disappointed by the way Cole handled the resolution of the relationship between Diem and Henri. To me, it felt like a bit of a cop-out for Diem to go to see Henri so she could end their relationship, only to discover that he had already begun a new relationship with a healer named Lana, whom Diem had previously worked with. However, I suppose the whole thing makes for good drama.
For a fantasy book that’s over 800 pages long in the hardcover edition, I was very pleasantly surprised to see that Heat of the Everflame didn’t suffer from a lot of pacing and filler issues compared to most fantasy books that are very long.
It was definitely interesting to have the book briefly switch to Luther’s point of view. I did think that the switch in point of view was somewhat abrupt, though, since it wasn’t labeled. The inclusion of Luther’s point of view in Heat of the Everflame made me feel REALLY glad that I listened to the book on audiobook for the most part; rather than simply read a physical copy of the book, since they had a different reader for Luther’s part of the book. That being said, I really wish that we had gotten a lot more of Luther’s point of view in the actual book itself than we did.
As for my thoughts on the ending of the book, I found it to be very action-packed and exciting; and while I do consider the ending to be very suspenseful, I don’t think Diem is going to die, especially since she’s the protagonist of the Kindred’s Curse Saga. However, I do think that it will be very interesting to see how Diem manages to survive the events that take place at the end of the book.
All things considered, Heat of the Everflame is without question an excellent addition to the Kindred’s Curse Saga, and a great fantasy novel in general that made me love the Kindred’s Curse Saga series even more than I already did. Cole definitely ended Heat of the Everflame in such a way that I’m without a doubt anxiously awaiting the release of the final book in the series, Burn of the Everflame, next year.
That being said, my final score for Heat of the Everflame is 10 out of 10.
No comments :
Post a Comment