I know people who read the Fourth Wing and raved about it; I picked it up in a bookstore, saw that it used first-person present-tense narration, and put it back immediately. I saw it at the library, and decided to give it another chance. I struggled to get into it, and then I saw a social media post of a bookstore display with the signed “worst books ever”; the two things on that table I have read I kind of believe deserve to be there. Guess where this is going; I don’t totally disagree about putting Fourth Wing on that table.
The premise is kind of standard YA fantasy; fish out of water with family issues must survive military college with dragons training, kind like if you mixed Harry Potter and Hermione, set it on Pern, with a general world situation similar to Game of Thrones (alliances, betrayals, murders, fuzzy politics involved, etc.). There’s definitely a chosen one factor, inevitable sudden and convenient power-ups, a bad boy vs boy next door decision to be made, and the inevitable last second plot twist to set up for the sequel.
I could almost like Violet, our Scribe-trained Rider cadet forced by her distant general mother into dragon rider training, except that 1) I hate the style of narration (not Violet’s fault), and 2) Violet keeps brining up how weak or unsuitable her body is. That gets old fast, especially once the chosen one specialness starts up. I also don’t get the attraction to the bad boy side of the potential love triangle; obviously Violet isn’t going to adore the sone of the man who rebelled against her mother, and he won’t love her. Obviously then the story must force them together, and suddenly Violet starts getting obsessed with how hot Xaden is.
The way the dragon-rider pairing works is actually interesting, but that’s usually not the focus. Once the dragons choose their riders (and it is dragon’s choice), the story suddenly forgets about the school/character-world building, and goes for the politics and battle stuff. That and sex. Once Violet makes her choice of partner, that’s about the only thing left to add to her character.
The world, the school, and the politics are interesting, but I don’t actually care about the characters except maybe a few of the dragons and side characters. I also doubt I’ll be back to this series because when a different narrator picks up for the final chapter, that voice is virtually identical to Violet’s. It adds slightly to the character, but not actually giving the voice any kind of distinction just irritated me enough that I about stopped caring.