Fourth Wing

Originally posted on Just Geeking by.

Content warnings:
This book contains scenes of blood, gore, violence, death, war, torture, creature death, genocide, suicide ideation, and bullying. There are scenes of physical and emotional abuse, including gaslighting. Death of parents and family members (off page) are discussed on page at various points throughout the book. The children of rebels are branded (off page) and are forced into indentured servitude at the War College, essentially giving them a death sentence.

When it comes to overly popular books, I don’t tend to be swayed by popular opinion. I read books based on my interests. I have heard so many mixed responses to Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros that normally I would avoid it. show more However, it has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) representation which is so rare in fiction, especially science fiction and fantasy, that I wanted to check this one out for myself. I would have checked Fourth Wing out as I like to review books with disability and neurodivergent representation to provide reviews for members of our community anyway, but this representation is particularly relevant for me as I have hypermobile EDS (hEDS). There are currently thirteen types of EDS, hEDS being one of them, and for those who know about the condition, please visit the Ehlers-Danlos Society website for more information.

Fourth Wing tells the story of a twenty-year-old woman who had prepared all her life to become a scribe. On the day that Violet is about to enter the Scribe Quadrant and begin her studies, her life is turned upside down by her mother’s decision that she will be joining the elite dragon riders instead. Her mother is a General and the commander of the Basgiath War College where dragon riders are trained. Violet’s choice doesn’t matter; no one will go against her mother’s wishes, and she wants her daughter to follow in her siblings’ footsteps.

The problem is that Violet’s body isn’t like everyone else’s; it’s weaker and injures easily. Her joints dislocate and sublux (partially dislocate or displace) and the War College is a dangerous enough place without being at such a physical disadvantage. It’s a death sentence, and her chances of even surviving the harsh crossing to even reach the College are slim.

When she makes it over the parapet, Violet finds herself in an environment that’s hostile in multiple ways. It’s not just the training, it’s the other riders who think she’s a liability for being weak, who hate her for her mother’s past actions and then there are the dragons themselves. Powerful creatures who are more likely to incinerate her on the spot than bond with a “fragile” human.

Will Violet survive the harsh life of Basgiath and become a dragon rider like her family before her, or will her body fail her?

The first thing I noticed about Fourth Wing was how utterly blasé Yarros was about death from the onset. The danger of Basgiath, especially for someone as “weak” as Violet, was implied over and over again and backed up by the constant deaths of characters. It made it impossible for me to become emotionally attached to any character in the book because Yarros did not discriminate. It didn’t matter if they were a minor character, an unnamed NPC or a main character; everyone was fair game.

Not being able to become attached to a character was not the only issue I had with Yarros’ constant obsession with killing characters off. It was one of several major plot holes that I came across in Fourth Wing. The dragon riders are elite warriors and their training is intense, to the point that they are killed during it. Got it. However, that makes no sense when you think about it. The whole concept of the world that Yarros has built is that the dragons bond with riders to keep the realm safe from a serious threat. How does killing off hundreds of students help achieve that? It’s counterintuitive and extremely wasteful of potential warriors who could train in other fields and still help protect the land.

Especially when you take in how they “train” and I use that term extremely loosely as there appears to be no physical training. The only physical training takes place in the form of sparring matches, and there is no directed learning. During these sparring matches, the rules are extremely loose, with one particularly violent student killing another through excessive force.

The students do not learn fighting styles, their skills primarily come from the knowledge that they bring with them before entering Basgiath, which they refine during the sparring matches. The dog-eat-dog environment pits students against each other, preventing them from learning from each other. After all, you don’t want your competition to have an upper hand.

While that all makes for good drama, again, it makes little sense for a military academy. It often feels that at every turn in Fourth Wing, Yarros is determined to handicap her characters rather than give them the tools to help them survive. This harsh and violent setting fuels a trope that I feel is the foundation of Fourth Wing; the chosen one.

Yarros reminds us at every turn that Violet is weak, that she’s fragile, and uses the constant barrage of death to drive the point home that we’re just one page away from our heroine failing. Of course, as the protagonist, we all know that is never going to happen because otherwise, it will be a very short book, which is what makes the constant commentary from Yarros even more ridiculous. It actually becomes offensive, and ableist because it honestly feels as though the author herself doesn’t believe that her heroine, a disabled woman, can do anything.

But she’s weak, she has a chronic illness, I hear you cry! Yes, that means she’s at a disadvantage, and yet other authors writing characters with chronic illnesses and disabilities somehow manage not to write a book where they are putting their character down on almost every page. It reeks of internal ableism, and I’m not talking about Violet’s. This is what bothered me the most about Fourth Wing, the constant implication that someone who is clearly not weak and is surviving while her stronger classmates are dying around her is weak and fragile JUST because she has a disability.

If Yarros had simply gone with Violet, managing the difficult task of surviving and excelling, then that would have been one thing. Instead, Violet is the ‘chosen one’, who continuously defies the odds. With one year of physical training, she manages to survive the obstacle course, while another character who has been training on them since childhood fails. She manages the impossible, doing something that has never been done in the history of dragon riders. It was also incredibly obvious from the moment that something rare was mentioned that it was going to end up involving Violet.

Concerning EDS representation, I felt that there wasn’t much of it. As with every book I’ve read so far that has EDS representation in it, Fourth Wing as someone who has hEDS I did not feel that the book represented the full variety of symptoms well. Specifically just how painful and all-encompassing Violet’s condition actually is. EDS affects every moving part of a person’s body which includes joints, ligaments, muscles, and tendons. So imagine just how much damage Violet was doing to hers while training.

I think that the lack of understanding of her condition is extremely noticeable by the number of readers who downplay her disability in their reviews or appear to not even notice it. Ableism accounts for some of this, but I think the way that Yarros has chosen to focus on Violet’s being weak rather than taking the time to describe Violet’s symptoms and EDS-related injuries (she gives them a sentence or two at most) plays a large part.

Of course, Fourth Wing is a fantasy novel and Violet’s condition is not given a specific name. We only know it is based on EDS from Yarros’ telling us this, but as she has the condition herself, I would have liked to have seen better representation.

Only twice in Fourth Wing does Violet use her hypermobile body to her advantage, and yes, being hypermobile has advantages. It isn’t all about pain, weakness and fragile joints, despite what Yarros would make you believe. For example, having loose joints means that people with EDS can bend in ways that normal people can’t (reaching the middle of your back is very handy!). As such, that should have given Violet an advantage in many sparring matches. Only one time does Yarros seem to remember this and have Violet twist out of a hold in a fight. During a big fight scene, Violet uses her intimate knowledge of joints and their weaknesses to injure an opponent. This made me chuckle because people with chronic illnesses do have a much better understanding of bodies and their weak points due to our lived experience.

Ella T Holmes wrote about toxic perseverance in her guest post GeekDis 2023, an annual event I run about disability representation (it has been wonderful to see so many reviews linking to this, so thank you!). As Ella points out many of Violet’s activities are high impact and that wording is deliberate. When I was first diagnosed as a teenager I was told to avoid high-impact activities at school as they could damage my joints – I was thrilled, I hated sports so I had essentially been given a legitimate excuse to avoid doing them. Yet Yarros has written a book where everything her protagonist does is high impact and yet she’s still surviving.

While Yarros offers explanations for Violet avoiding treatment at every turn, we have to remember that she is the author and could have quite as easily done the opposite. Every time I found myself scratching my head at Yarros’ authorial decisions in this book more than I have in any other book, and that includes the ones I’ve DNFed.

On top of all this, we also have Dain, Violet’s childhood friend who spends his every waking moment trying to convince Violet to quit and become a scribe. His every action is toxic, and there are so many red flags.

Despite all these reservations I’ve given Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros three stars. It’s not the worst book I’ve ever read, and beneath the plot holes and issues I have with the representation, there were parts that I enjoyed. Essentially the parts with the dragons. If I could have skipped out all constant deaths and just got to the part with the dragons, then I’d have been good. The conversations with Violet and her dragon were hilarious; who doesn’t love a grumpy old dragon?

One final thing I do need to say is that I’m not quite sure why people say this book is so steamy. I went into expecting sex scenes galore and was very surprised with how little there was. There is a lot of sexual tension but not that much action compared to other books I’ve read.

Will I read the next book? I don’t know. If my library gets it in then I might, but I’m not going to go looking for it.

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There was a lot of praise for this book and anticipation for the sequel, but I've been "off" fantasy for a while, especially large tomes so put it on my list to check out later. Why avoid big books? It's weird but holding thick or heavy books can make my thumbs sublux, which is no fun. (It's from a hereditary condition called Ehler's Danlos Syndrome aka EDS).
Anyhow a lot of readers I know read/loved/raved about the books, especially one who I've known just about since the time I joined BookCrossing. We've corresponded for years, followed each other's family through joys and sorrows. She is a treasured friend, and her family is a blessing to know, yet we've never actually met in person. It was her enthusiasm for the series that show more encouraged me to (finally) pick up the book, despite its size.
Below is in part what I what I wrote her after starting the book.
'... I finally got an ebook copy of The Fourth Wing (have the hardback but hands don't work), and in the first few pages, was stunned. The story interested me, but even moreso, the problems Violet had with her body just about smacked me in the face. I thought to myself, "this gal has EDS. No way she doesn't." Example after example piled up, until one example was so clearly what went on in my life, that I posted about it on Instagram, then did my research. Violet has EDS, yes, but so does the author and 4 (yes, FOUR) of her sons. Just seeing this in a major character in a book did something to me, something just as powerful as getting an actual diagnosis after so many years of knowing my world was experienced differently physically from the way others did. And, I have you to thank. Your enthusiasm about these books has kept them to the front of my mind. I'm not explaining very well, but it was very meaningful for me to see this in print. It reminded me that in my early 20's I made the first major push to strengthen myself, thinking that if my muscles were "tougher" I wouldn't get so many injuries. I'm still doing that to this day, working hard to strengthen the surrounding joint muscles. Just like Violet."

Reading about a character with what I have has been profoundly moving. Maybe it's time to bond with my dragon. show less

Violet has been training to be a scholar for what seems like most of her life, under the tutelage of her own scholar father. After his death she continued on that path, until her mother – a dragon rider of considerable rank – made the executive decision that Violet would follow in her mother’s (and her brother’s, and her sister’s) footsteps and enter the dragon rider training program. It’s a dangerous career path, with the majority of the first year students ending up dead before the year is over (or, really, even started), and Violet is not a likely candidate for survival. She’s short, slight, and her bones are devastatingly brittle. Oh, and there’s a giant target on her back, since the children of those who led the show more rebellion several years ago all would love to kill her because her mother is the reason most of their parents are dead. Her number one threat is the leader of the rebellion kids – and also Violet’s assigned wing leader. He’s the best of the riders and very, very dangerous. Also? Very, very handsome. Because of course he is. But Violet has some tricks up her sleeve, including a ridiculous amount of courage and stubbornness, so underestimating her is probably not the best idea.

Oh my lordy lou, I adored this book and can’t wait to get my hands on the next one. It ticks so many of my boxes: fabulous world building, amazingly detailed characters, excellent writing, superb twists, steamy enemies-to-lovers romance. It’s so, so good. show less

If you are like me and delayed reading FOURTH WING by Rebecca Yarros because it was THE It book last year, do yourself a favor and read it. Now. Not only does it live up to the hype, it exceeds it. I finished the book in twenty-four hours, and it has been years since I've done that. I regret only that it took me so long to read this masterpiece.

Since finishing FOURTH WING a week ago, I've been trying to determine one area of weakness because no book is perfect. Except, FOURTH WING may be perfect because I can't find fault in anything. Violet and the other characters are great, with strong development where necessary. The story itself is unique and fascinating. Ms. Yarros builds the world of Empyrean and its war college so well that it show more requires no effort to picture them.

The slow-burn romance in FOURTH WING is one of the slowest of slow burns, and the tension is nigh unbearable. But once those sparks finally meet, watch out. The romance is everything you could ever want in an enemies-to-lovers story and everything you never knew you wanted. Somehow, Ms. Yarros manages to keep up the "will they or won't they" tension until the very end, and everything about that tension is magic. Your head will explode, you will get the best butterflies in your belly, and you will never look at your significant other in the same way again.

And the dragons! The dragons! The story would not be the same without the dragons. They are the heart of Violet's story after all. But the dragons in FOURTH WING are unlike dragons in other stories I've read. They have personality while still being terrifying, and deadly while also providing comfort. Plus, you have to appreciate any entity so willing to put puny humans in their place. They are at the top of the food chain, and they make sure everyone remembers it. They take the drama out of human interactions and distill them down to their basic elements. I don't know how she does it, but the FOURTH WING dragons are so real and so worth everything Violet endures to become a rider.

After finally discovering the magic of FOURTH WING, my biggest dilemma now is whether to read the second book in the series or wait a little longer. It appears The Empyrean series will consist of five books when Ms. Yarros finishes, and we don't even have a publication date for book three yet. On the one hand, I want more of Violet, Xaden, and the dragons more than I've wanted anything in a long time. But the wait for book three might kill me. In the meantime, I'll just urge everyone and anyone to read this fabulous book if you haven't already. It just might be bookish perfection. show less

There was so much hype behind this book that I honestly wasn’t sure I wanted to read it. I tend to avoid “hype trains” when it comes to literature. Between that and knowing this series is above my spice level, ( I am a ‘fade to black’ kind-of gal) I am surprised at myself for letting my friend onceuponforeva (check her out on tiktok) talk me into reading it. I do want to say while I deeply enjoy fantasy, romantasy is not my go to. That said I will be writing my review without allowing my discomfort of the spice to lower the star rating. My star rating is of how I felt about the world building/story on a fantasy level.

Our story takes place in the country of Navarre, home to fearsome and powerful dragons. Hidden away from the show more world behind protective wards, young Navarrians choose which path they will take to ensure the future of their kingdom. On Conscription Day at Basgiath War College, Violet dreads that the choice has been made for her. Up until six months ago, she had been training her entire life to be a scribe. Her cold emotionally distant mother, who is second in command of the riders, has decided her future for her. Her sister Mira, does her best to prepare her for the deadly initiation of The Riders Quadrant.

Violet survives day one and makes friends and enemies as she crossed the deadly Parapet. The same could not be said for 70 other first years. Can she use her years of scribe training to survive in a place where brawn rules? Her only options are graduate or die. Violet must be careful of who she trusts and even more so who she loves. After surviving the Threshing and finding a mysterious note from her late father, she begins to suspect that leadership are hiding far more than just a war.

Things I enjoyed on a personal note:

I loved the diverse cast of characters, everyone just living each day fully. There seemed to be no hang-ups about sexuality, race, or gender. I truly enjoyed how betrayal was portrayed. I think a lot of us have had a relationship where we cared for/respected someone far more than they cared/respected back, and the reality of it is painful and difficult to digest. The author genuinely captured the emotion behind it. I deeply enjoyed sassy dragons. Honestly probably the best part of the book imo1 . The complexity of the signet powers being a reflection of who you are adds a lot to character development.

Things I did not enjoy:

I felt there was way too much foreshadowing. There were very few surprises that I did not see coming just entirely based on clues/hints given. As I have already said the spice scenes are just not for me. I am a very sex positive person, but if one of my friends went on (for ten pages) about how they had five orgasms and destroyed their bedroom furniture, I would roll my eyes. The use of common vernacular was an absolute no. I kept thinking I would get used to it, but it really just ruined my immersion. I like my fantasy to be more fantastical. I really do not understand why toxic relationships are considered ‘sexy’. Xaden gives firm boundaries that Violet promptly ignores. If the roles were reversed and the female love interest was being relentlessly hounded by the male love interest, it would be cringey and uncomfortable. Why is there a double standard? Boundaries from both sides should be respected.

Violet: “What if I want to talk about it?:

Xaden: ” Then feel free, but it doesn’t mean I have to be a part of the conversation. We’re both allowed our boundaries, and this is one of mine.”

Last but not least, world/society inconsistency. It is really hard to believe that a society, where the cruelest, most sadistic people, raise to positions of extreme power, and that society lasts for hundreds of years. People who literally enjoy just killing other human beings, (like Jack) not only have a dragon to abuse their power with, but also a signet ability, actual magic, to enforce their will on ordinary citizens. Beyond that human inconsistency, is the dragon politics. Dragons fully know that it kills a part of their soul when their riders die, and therefore can only bond so many times before they literally die of a broken heart. Yet they have no issues whatsoever to kill another dragons bonded rider? That, mixed with the declining birth rates, does not make any sense. Surely, the wise and ancient species understands they are heading for extinction if they keep this up? show less

Summary
At Basgiath War College, you either soar with dragons or meet a fiery end. Violet Sorrengail's fate was supposed to be written among quiet bookshelves. But destiny, and her iron-willed mother, had other plans. Now, amidst aspiring dragon riders who see her as an easy mark, Violet finds herself in the crosshairs of not just any cadet, but Xaden Riorson, the fiercest of them all. With the world outside the walls of Basgiath teetering on the edge, Violet's biggest challenge isn't just staying alive or decoding the dangerous dance between love and hate. It's unearthing a secret so dark, it could crumble a kingdom. Will Violet survive, or will she be just another casualty in the deadly game of dragons?

My Thoughts
This book has been show more everywhere you look among book influencers, and I thought there was no way that yet another high fantasy romance could live up to this much hype… especially one with dragons.

When I’m wrong, I’m wrong!

I started reading it before bed, which was a mistake because I didn’t sleep until I was 2/3 of the way through (and it’s 500 pages!). Rebecca wrote an easy-to-devour book that contains a lot of the same dystopic fantasy elements you know and love (i.e. factions, life or death challenges, heroine who learns to fight) but somehow manages to write it all in a way that is creative, new and all her own.

> Violet Sorrengail may be one of the most personally relatable FMCs I have read in a while. Despite her physical limitations which will always be a part of her, she learns that there is more than one way to be strong. She isn’t someone who is fearless, but actively facing her fears to prove to no one but herself that she is capable of things no one else ever saw for her.
Incredible chronic illness representation and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that her disabilities never magically go away but instead, there are accommodations and ways for her to adapt and be just as capable as everyone else.

> Xaden Riorson saw all of Violet for who she is and never asked her to change. More incredible disability representation in that Yarros didn’t write a man who “saw past her physical limitations” or acted as a caretaker of sorts. Xaden saw every part of her, including her disabilities. He provided accommodations without her having to fight for them, and he did it without attention or being rewarded. I am so glad the author didn’t applaud him for those things because basic accommodations are the bare minimum.

> Queer Representation is another thing that the author handled quite well. The friend who slept with people of all genders never had to come out, and one character used they/them pronouns without needing to correct the protagonist or get their thoughts on the matter. So many writers include queer characters in such a self-congratulatory way and it immediately turns me off to a book. (For added context, I am a queer person).

Overall, this book is an easy 5-star read for me because it pleasantly surprised me, made me feel seen, and left me wanting more.
I totally get why people were turned off by predictable ending scenes or felt there were moments of cliche. I don’t mind a bit of that, and it checked all my boxes. Can’t wait for November!! show less

I will preface this review by admitting that I do not really care very much for fantasy and romance, or, at the risk of sounding like a snob, books that are considered "bestsellers". However, I was in need of a book that would take me far, far away from reality, and dare I say, this book delivered. Filled with action, adventure, mortal danger, a love affair, highly dangerous dragons (and gryphons), magic, sex, friendship, and family drama, I was very surprised at my overall enjoyment of this book. And, lucky me, there's two more books in the series, which I will definitely read.

Also, Violet is badass. I love her.