Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros book cover for the Book of the Day romantasy book review

Our Score4.9/ 5

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EDITION PUBLISHEDNovember 2023

Genres

Themes

Trust, secrecy, and what honesty actually costsInstitutional lies and who profits from themLoyalty split between love and dutyLiving and fighting with a body that fights back

Iron Flame

Name: Iron Flame
Author: Rebecca Yarros

Rebecca Yarros

The Empyrean's second book sends Violet Sorrengail back to Basgiath War College under a commandant who has built the whole year around breaking her, with Xaden posted elsewhere and the truth between them going unsaid. Rebecca Yarros writes a slower burn than Fourth Wing and then detonates it: bigger world, higher stakes, a final chapter that resets the series.

The Review

Our take

Yarros does something risky at the start of this one. She splits her couple up and makes you sit in it. Violet is back at Basgiath under a new vice-commandant who treats her existence as a personnel problem to be solved, Xaden is off being a lieutenant somewhere she can't reach, and the two of them keep almost telling each other the truth and then not. It's frustrating on purpose. Stay with it.

Because when the trust finally cracks open, it repays every page of the withholding. There's a scene roughly two-thirds through where Violet stops asking Xaden to explain himself and simply tells him what she already knows, and the power in the room reverses inside about four lines of dialogue. Yarros writes that shift beautifully. From there it becomes a book about what two people will destroy for each other, and the heat comes back with it. She does not fade to black.

The world gets much bigger too. Fourth Wing kept you inside one war college with one set of rules; Iron Flame pushes past the wards, adds politics, adds a whole second cohort of characters worth caring about, and introduces a threat that reframes what the war has actually been about since page one. The dragons get more personality rather than less, which is harder to pull off than it sounds. Andarna's arc on its own justifies the page count.

Why you should read

Dragon-rider fantasy with a real romance engine
Slow-burn trust arcs that pay off explosively
Military academy settings with genuine danger
Series you intend to binge straight through

What to expect

A slower first third that rewards patience
Open-door heat once the trust finally breaks
Major worldbuilding expansion past book one
A cliffhanger revelation in the final chapter

Yes, the first third moves slower than book one, and the circling between Violet and Xaden will test you before it pays. It's a long novel that takes its time getting to the runway. Then the last hundred and fifty pages happen. Yarros stages a siege and a revelation simultaneously, and the closing chapter delivers a piece of information large enough to change what you thought the series was doing. I finished it at one in the morning and went looking for book three before I'd put the light out.

Reviewed by Sloane · How our reviews are written

4.9 - Incredible

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Common questions

What is Iron Flame about?: Yarros does something risky at the start of this one. She splits her couple up and makes you sit in it. Violet is back at Basgiath under a new vice-commandant who treats her existence as a personnel problem to be solved, Xaden is off being a lieutenant somewhere she can't reach, and the two of…
Is Iron Flame worth reading?: We scored Iron Flame 4.9 out of 5. The Empyrean's second book sends Violet Sorrengail back to Basgiath War College under a commandant who has built the whole year around breaking her, with Xaden posted elsewhere and the truth between them going unsaid. Rebecca Yarros writes a slower burn than Fourth Wing and…