Fire

I reread Fire regularly because I love the heroine, Fire, and her conundrum: how can she love herself when her beauty is so destructive, when it inspires such terrible behavior in the people around her? We think of beauty as an asset, sure that we would be happier, more confident, more liked if we were more beautiful, and Cashore explores the limits of beauty in this novel. She also digs deep into a very problematic father/daughter relationship as Fire deals with the lessons her father, Cansrel, taught her about how to use her beauty for power, and decides to forge… show more.

I have read this book countless times and will continue to read it countless times. The main character: Fire, is a perfect example of a strong female character that is both powerful as well as vulnerable. These are a mix of traits I find rare in fiction and love how it’s portrayed by Kristin’s beautiful writing style. 

This book is more in the fantasy realm but fits with science fiction too as all the magical things in this realm are very much explained in detail of why and how it exists. This is a colorful and adventurous book that upped my imaginary game as a writer. Science can turn fantasy into something almost real. The main character and the extraordinary creatures are otherworldly, but explained so well on how and why they exist. Why the main character’s hair is so red like fire and seems to move like fire, that fantasy almost to me feels like science… show more.