Book Review: The Awakening Fire by Cassidy Faline

The Awakening Fire was an easy to follow, YA epic, political fantasy that saw three young men vying for one throne to rule them all.

Current reigning monarch Lord Reta has had control for too long. Unrest is brewing throughout the country and three young men seek the throne. Each player in this game has motive, some of them noble, others based in revenge. A bloody game of lost friendships, backstabbing and ultimate belief in the ancients is about to unfold; but the Kingdom of Retall may not survive another war.

Gannon Teris, a man seeking to kill the current King and take the throne back for his family. Gannon seeks to break away from under his father’s thumb and prove that he can take the throne and being honour back to the Teris name. His family’s portraits are still hanging on the castle walls, it belongs to him and he will stop at nothing to take it back, even if it means killing his friends.

Hieronymus Purvis, man of the people and believer of the ancients. His loyalty to the old laws and the Gods that govern them see him accidently chosen as the new leader. A position he didn’t know he wanted until it was in the palm of his hands. Heiro will have to decide where his loyalties lie, with his friend Teris or with the people of Retall. A decision neither party will take lightly.

Lamont Renald, King’s choice for the throne. When the King took ill throughout the fight for the castle Lamont was gifted the signet ring which would give him the throne. Privy to the castle secrets and the answers to why the country was run in a certain way, Lamont will need to fight for his life and his throne against a people who wish to see him dead.

The three men will clash more than their swords to see Retall become great once more.

The Awakening Fire was an enjoyable YA novel, it had the right amount of intrigue to keep me entertained while keeping the plot line fairly simple to grasp for younger readers. Each of our main characters had obvious motivations for the throne. Their different beliefs surrounding leadership bought about the conflict for the novel which then led to extreme consequences. It was fun to see the friendship between two of our characters turn on its head when push came to shove and they put the throne over an individual. That being said each character played well into a known and loved fantasy trope giving the story a familiar, classic and comforting feeling.

The book was also paced well, each time I picked it up, I would breeze through 100 pages and not want to put it down. The action and intrigue kept the book interesting while the snappy, easy to read and process prose gave it an addictive feeling. I would have absolutely loved a book like this falling into my hands during high school. The storytelling style allowed me to be immersed with our surroundings and while I didn’t root for any character in particular, I was interested in the outcomes.

Faline has also done a great job in building up an extremely unlikable character that had stakes in the throne but didn’t seek the crown itself. This storyline tied all three together out of pure motivation to keep his own disgusting and questionable motivations to himself. Lord Kiad was awful, motivated by lust, violence, and an ability to take what he wanted, when he wanted and from who he wanted made me actively hate him whenever he was on the page.

I will say outside of Kiad, I didn’t feel myself strongly one way or the other towards any of the other characters. Some felt like placeholders to move storylines along without having a real role in the overarching plot itself. The main characters while they had clear motivations felt somewhat two dimensional and didn’t see much outside of their current goal giving them any sort of personality I could relate to. There were a couple of side characters I would like to know more about, and I hope we see them in future instalments. I am admittedly not a character driven reader, so these things don’t tend to bother me all that much personally, but worth mentioning for all the readers out there that love to get invested in their people.

Overall, I had a good time with The Awakening Fire and look forward to seeing where this tale goes next, when the ancients rise once more.