Onyx Storm: Empyrean, Book 3
Rebecca Yarros
4.6
Iron Flame: Empyrean, Book 2
by Rebecca YarrosCategory
About this book
“The first year is when some of us lose our lives. The second year is when the rest of us lose our humanity." Xaden Riorson Everyone expected Violet Sorrengail to die during her first year at Basgiath War College-Violet included. But Threshing was only the first impossible test meant to weed out the weak-willed, the unworthy, and the unlucky. Now the real training begins, and Violet’s already wondering how she’ll get through. It’s not just that it’s grueling and maliciously brutal, or even that it’s designed to stretch the riders’ capacity for pain beyond endurance. It’s the new vice commandant, who’s made it his personal mission to teach Violet exactly how powerless she is–unless she betrays the man she loves. Although Violet’s body might be weaker and frailer than everyone else’s, she still has her wits and a will of iron. And leadership is forgetting the most important lesson Basgiath has taught her: Dragon riders make their own rules. But a determination to survive won’t be enough this year. Because Violet knows the real secret hidden for centuries at Basgiath War College and nothing, not even dragon fire, may be enough to save them in the end. The Empyrean series is best enjoyed in order. Book #1 Fourth Wing Book #2 Iron Flame
Available Formats
Audiobook: $0.00 Audiobook: $0.00
What readers are saying
Rogue1994Top tier fantasy at its finest, kind of
"Iron Flame Before i start this review, i’m going to assume if you’re looking at the second book, you’ve read the first so there will be spoilers from the first book, fair warning. For starters the overall story of Iron Flame is very well written, with plenty of adventure, battle, suspense, and action the whole way through. However some parts this “second year around” feel lack luster and rushed through. Parts that were major focal points in the first book like the parapet, the gauntlet, and threshing that took a whole chapter or chapters to get through, only get a couple of pages this time and it lessens the effect of the event. Character development is well done in this book, picking up right where the last book dropped off so there isn’t a lot of “gray area” in that transition for the characters. New characters come in to play and become favorites with enough backstory to keep them interesting. The negatives for this story however kind of fall in the same lane as the last book. All the romantic scenes between Violet and Xaden just feel overdone and obnoxious to the point you want to skip pages just to get back to the actual story. There is only so many times someone can obsesses over a certain body part, “relic”, or feature before it gets to the point of annoyance. They literally take what should be 3 pages of sex scene, and stretch it out for full length chapters because we can’t get over how beautiful someone’s hair is, or how etched their muscle’s are. One of the cardinal sins of writing is overuse of repetition, and the sex scenes just go over the top with it. Overall, if you can get through small annoyances of reading the same thing over and over again when it cones to the intimate scenes, the story itself is fantastic and well written. ["
April 30, 2026 Verified Purchase
Lindsi @ Do You Dog-ear?"Love, betrayal, unexpected plot twists, new friends..."
"I still haven't reviewed Fourth Wing, but decided to go ahead and write this one while the story was still fresh on my mind. I was already late to the game with this series, but I put myself on the waiting list for an audiobook at my library as soon as I was able to after falling in love with these characters during Fourth Wing. Additionally, Rebecca Soler is one of my absolute favorite narrators and she does an amazing job with this series. Yarros not only makes me fall in love with Violet and Xaden, but every secondary character is beloved as well. Losing any of them would be devasting to my heart, so that final battle in Iron Flame had my pulse racing right along with Violet's. I was already worried about finishing the book since everyone said they literally stared at a wall for 20 minutes afterwards, but I still wasn't expecting the cliffhanger we're left with. Haven't we been through enough by now? I will say that I didn't like how long it took Violent and Xaden to work through their issues. A lack of communication between characters is a huge turn off for me in books, especially when they're romantically involved. Violet knew who he was before she fell in love with him, yet she made demands and put expectations on him that were a bit unfair. She didn't completely trust him because he wouldn't tell her everything, but everyone in this series has secrets, including her. She kept demanding total honesty and full disclosure despite other lives being at risk if she knew. Yarros managed to address these issues in a way that wasn't cringeworthy, so at least that aspect of the book was tolerable and didn't ruin everything else for me. The dragons are still my favorite part of these books. I love their sarcasm and menacing attitudes, especially when directed towards their own riders. Their personalities are perfection. Adolescent Adarna is an absolute delight to read about, and her getting on Tairn's nerves never fails to make me smile. I'm really happy we learned more about them in Iron Flame because so much is still a mystery. Love, betrayal, unexpected plot twists, new friends and frenemies, dragons and gryphons, riders and flyers, war, loss - Iron Flame has all that and more. I highly recommend this series if you enjoy fantasy and fast-paced adventure stories. (★★★★★) ["
December 30, 2023 Verified Purchase
