The Flames of Hope

I avoided this book for a long time, because after Legends: Dragonslayer and The Dangerous Gift, I just had a feeling that the book would not be that good.

And I don't think 13-year-old Me's intuition was wrong.

Finally, I read it, and it was just okay. It felt bland and different and so much less epic than what I could envision when I read The Lost Continent. The ideas are cool, Lizard was really cool, but the book still sucked. Well, sucked is a strong word. The book simply wasn't that good.

And it's not just a change in my tastes; yeah, I've gotten older and more critical of commercial literature. But, when I go back to older books, such as Legends: Darkstalker, Talons of Power, and Escaping Peril, they are still good, solid books. This book is super forgettable.

Here are my main problems with the book:
1. Humans
2. Bad pacing
3. Boring characters
4. Lack of Epic-ness / the Conclusion

Humans
Ugh. I'm reading a book about dragons...I love Wings of Fire because it is about dragons! But, this book has too much human!

Maybe it's a pet peeve of mine, but I despise Wren. I want her and Sky to stay in their own separate universes, pretty much. Plus, if I hadn't read Dragonslayer, I would be so confused by their presence.

I feel like the humans break the immersion and believability of the books when they are speaking the same language so easily. Plus, Sutherland keeps changing the size of the humans. Are they small enough to fit in dragon claws? But big enough to hold a baby dragon efforlessly? How small are the dragon eggs if the humans can put them in boxes and carry them? In Moon Rising, it is shown that blueberries are bigger than humans. But then, a dragon egg must be smaller than a blueberry? It just makes no sense—I hate the humans, they confuse me too much!

And then, I don't like that in this book they are referred to as “humans”. I miss the term “scavengers.” Even “reading monkeys” is better. Outright saying “human” just breaks the feeling of immersion for me.

Bad Pacing
I know Wings of Fire has always had fast pacing. But this book feels waaaay too fast!
Also, I don't know how, but despite the fast pacing, it feels like barely anything happens. Luna and friends fly to Pantala, some friends get captured, Luna finds Silkwings hiding in a cave, Luna follows human into Abyss, Luna finds out how the mind-control works, Luna defeats mind-control plant. It happens really quickly...but it didn't feel like an adventure.

I wanted the last book to be an adventure, I guess. Like The Lost Continent and The Hive Queen were adventures. Those books had fast pacing, but the pacing was a tool to fit a lot of cool stuff into the narrative. In Flames of Hope, on the other hand, I feel like barely anything happened. I wanted to see Moon trick the HiveWings into thinking she was Clearsight. I wanted to see Queen Wasp get defeated in a real, epic fight. I wanted to see a real battle against the Hivemind, or Breath of Evil, or whatever.

But this book feels really limited and tame, even with the fast pacing. It is just...not exciting. Even when they win, it is done in such a lame way. It is such a downgrade from how this arc began, and I can tell that Sutherland is probably just tired of writing about dragons.

So, the fast pacing in this book, rather than allowing more stuff to happen, results in a choppy, limited, lame book. It feels only partially-done.

Boring Characters
This book has the absolute worst cast of main characters of any Wings of Fire book. The main cast in arcs 1 and 2 are very memorable and distinctive. This book's characters are boooring.

- Bullfrog - clumsy MudWing who doesn't talk

- Pineapple - innocent clowny RainWing

- Lynx - quiet, smart IceWing

- Sky - SkyWing babychild who comes along for no good reason

- Wren - feisty human who comes along for no good reason

These characters cannot really be expanded beyond these basic sentences.

And then we have our beloved Tsunami, Qibli, and Moon...and they are also written so...boringly. Tsunami is reduced to fighting and fierceness and no spark that made her special in previous books. Qibli is cocky and “funny”, but he is also missing something. Moon is fine. She's just fine.

I feel like these characters were not written as well as they were in previous books. It's almost like a different author wrote the book. Again, I think Sutherland is just getting tired of writing dragons—I'd get tired of it, too.

And then Luna...is the most boring of them all. Her personality is literally this: tapestry, fake-smile, girlfriend. She doesn't even have the spirit I thought she had in The Lost Continent. I didn't expect her to be a boring narrator, but she was.

Anyway, the characters are so boring. The new characters were useless, as Sutherland did not attempt to really expand or develop them enough to be likeable or add much to the book. Most of them are useless. Axolotle is most useless of all; I could cut him out of the plot summary, and it would not change a thing. I did not like these characters, and even old characters I already knew just weren't written the same.

Lack of Epic-ness / Conclusion
This book was so...not epic. It was not the satisfying conclusion I believe this arc deserved. There was no large-scale final battle with the LeafWings and Chrysalis pitted against the Hive armies. There was no battle against Queen Wasp, nor was there even a proper, epic villain defeat for her. Clearsight was barely mentioned, even though she is important to the 3rd arc. We don't get a glimpse of the New Pantala, only speculation as the characters talk about what it could be. Why couldn't I see, like, Moon's vision of what it could be, instead? That'd be much more epic!

Like, the thing with Lizard was cool...the thing with the evil human was not cool. He was so boring. The Scorching backstory was interesting, I guess...

But, there was so much potential wasted! There is no epicness in the conclusion of the arc. I am disappointed.

How This Book Can Be Fixed
- further develop side characters
- separate Luna from all her friends except Cricket. That way, irrelevant characters are cut out from the main plot.
- the sub-theme of Luna learning to let go of prejudices could be farther developed if Luna and Cricket were forced to work together alone.
- More Chrysalis for more epicness and adventure
- An actual mission against Wasp + an actual mission to rescue Luna's friends
- More conflict with Blue and Swordtail—Luna is forced to face her loved ones in combat.
- As the enemy closes in, Luna must fight her prejudices even harder and struggles to see the humanity in her enemies. She is confused about Cricket's alliance with her.
- The Abyss thing is a subplot under the main mission to kill Queen Wasp
- In an all-is-lost moment, in the battle against Wasp, Luna is separated from Cricket and plunges into the Abyss. Now, she is alone in a dark cave, and she knows Wasp is winning.
- ...then she discovers the ‘secret buried far below'. Lizard and human-guy.
- After a bit of Lizard and human-guy lore, and Luna must make the choice to kill the plant, even if it also means killing innocent Lizard. It isn't easy, though. She has to fight mind-controlled goons before she can reach the vines.
- She ends up killing Lizard without Lizard's consent (as it is the only way), but shows compassion to Lizard before she dies, giving the dragonet happy memories to experience during her final moments. Lizard does not want to die, but Luna cuts the vine anyways. Luna did what she had to do, but she also found it in her to be compassionate towards her enemy, and see Lizard like she did any other dragon. From Cricket, she has learned to show mercy to her enemies.
- Wasp's mind control stops working, and many confused and exhausted HiveWings flee the battle or collapse. Wasp is captured.
- Luna and her friends are reunited. Then, she sees Blue and Swordtail, and finally, when she looks into their eyes, she can see that they are themselves.
- Through Moonwatcher, we get a glimpse of the future of Pantala and Pyrhhia, and we see that it is the world that Clearsight would have wanted. And it is the world that the Silkwings and LeafWings have been waiting for.

I just thought that off the top of my head, and it is much more complicated to to turn that into a book. But, I think saving the Abyss for the climax would have been the better choice for this book.

Anyway, I think this would be something around 3.3 stars.