Fourth Wing
⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ½ ☆ ☆
Fourth Wing (Empyrean, Book 1) by Rebecca Yarros
Another step towards the death of YA Fantasy. ☠️🐉
Let’s start with the obvious: Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is overrated. It's a solid book, sure, but wildly, relentlessly, absurdly overrated. 📈
So why the 3½ stars? Because, despite the hype, it is good. But the sheer level of obsession surrounding this book is way out of proportion to what it actually delivers.
The most immersion-breaking aspect? The modern language. Coming from an author known for New Adult romance, this could be a leftover habit or perhaps an intentional choice. Either way, it doesn’t work. If the book had embraced a more traditionally “fantasy” vernacular, much of its immersion-breaking tone might have been avoided.
The middle section drags. For what feels like a huge chunk of the book, not much happens. The plot seems aimless until the final chapter, where the real story of the Empyrean series finally starts to peek through. That’s the root of my issue: Fourth Wing is entertaining, flaws and all, but it leans heavily on the promise of the series to come. Maybe when Iron Flame (or however long this series ends up being) is complete, I’ll be able to appreciate this first installment in a new light.
Then there’s the ever-present talk about how dangerous Basgiath War College is, how only a fraction of students survive. But that danger? It’s all tell, no show. Instead of building tension, we’re just repeatedly told that someone we didn’t know and didn’t care about has died. 💀 Again. 💀 And again. 💀 These deaths don’t carry emotional weight because we were never given time to connect with the victims. It starts feeling like the school exists just to casually murder its students, and the world-building doesn’t explain how an army could possibly function with such a high attrition rate during training.
As a reader, hearing that a bunch of anonymous characters died doesn’t create stakes. The illusion of danger only works when there’s emotional investment. A single chapter showing camaraderie and students bonding over meals or downtime could’ve gone a long way. Then, when those characters die, their absence might actually hurt.
Overall, yes, Fourth Wing is enjoyable, but it’s also nothing new. It offers familiar tropes in a shiny new package. Whether that feels exciting or tired will depend on how okay you are with more of the same.
Normally, I avoid comparisons in my reviews. I prefer to judge a book on its own terms, not against others it wasn’t trying to emulate. But in Fourth Wing’s case, its massive popularity is tied to how strongly it echoes other blockbuster YA series: ACOTAR, Throne of Glass, Shadow and Bone, Red Queen. So yes, if you’re a Sarah J. Maas fan, this book will probably scratch that itch.
But here’s why Fourth Wing might just be the death knell for YA as a meaningful category: while it’s marketed as YA, it’s actually very adult. From the explicit language 🤬, to the graphic violence ⚔️, to the steamy romance ❤️, it’s YA in label only. Like many other bestsellers, it’s categorized as YA simply because the characters are young, not because the content is appropriate for that age group. This is a trend we’re already seeing shift, with series like ACOTAR being moved to adult fantasy sections in bookstores.
So, the question becomes: if this trend continues, will actual YA fantasy, stories written for young adults, fade into obscurity? 🚫📚
