A Fate of Wrath & Flame

A Fate of Wrath & Flame by K.A. Tucker

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


*** Possible Spoilers ***

On the whole I enjoyed this book. The author provides the type of story which made me want to find out what happened next. That said, this book is not without its faults although what I regard as a fault, others may regard as a virtue.

This book is yet ANOTHER vampire story. Don't authors ever get tired of the same tired trope. Sure, vampires make perfectly good characters, but the rising heat, the sudden intake of breath, the perfect sculpted muscular body - you get the idea. This is as much a romance novel as it is a fantasy. I sometimes think Stephenie Meyer and Anne Rice cursed the genre. In any event there is a LOT of hot flushes and smoldering glances you need to wade through. That part was merely annoying. Then, of course there is the obligatory sex scene. I listened to the audio version of this book so it wasn't practical to just skip over it. I did, however, have to chuckle at one reviewer who complained she thought the book might be YA because it contained so little sex. Evidently that one is in it for the erotica and should probably stick to books labeled as such. For me, there was far too much heavy breathing and I had to wonder if the author was attempting to combine Fantasy with Chicklit.

What the author does and does well is world building. This is a complex society into which the protagonist is jettisoned. It's largely medieval with plenty of court intrigue. It's impossible to know who is supporting whom and what betrayals are likely to take place. It is highly structured with a vampiric nobility enslaving the peasants who have to work for their masters and on whom the master feed. Needless to say the protagonist and her lover, newly made king after his parents were assassinated, object strongly to this class system and we, the readers, are subject to a certain amount of preaching on the evils of such a hierarchy. Fortunately the intrigues and world building holds this thing together.

The ending is pretty bad. Since this is a series one can't expect a cut-and-dried ending but the author was determined to persuade readers to carry on with the series by ending in a cliff-hanger. I may read the next book ... someday ... maybe not.

If you like palace intrigue, competent world building and don't mind a cliff-hanging ending then I think you'll like this book. In addition if you like dark-eyed, well-muscled vampires who, being king, are quite wealthy you'll find that here. Finally if you like plenty of heavy breathing and heat pouring through one's body jump in. This book has all of those.



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