Reviewed by Larissa
TITLE: Wings of Fire
SERIES: The Godstone Saga, Book 4
AUTHOR: Jocelynn Drake
NARRATOR: Kale Williams
PUBLISHER: Self-published
LENGTH: 11 hours and 17 minutes
RELEASE DATE: April 28, 2022
BLURB:
Secrets can kill.
The Goddess of Fire calls from the Isle of Stone, and Caelan must obey.
But the new king must first unravel a lifetime of secrets if he wants to have any chance of saving Drayce’s life.
Caelan and his companions battle dragon clans and cranky gods in their quest to protect their world from the Goddess of the Hunt.
And if they’re lucky, they might even get a little help from an unexpected source.
Wings of Fire is the fourth book in the six-book Godstone Saga fantasy series and is not a stand-alone. The story contains danger, secrets, bossy gods, stolen kisses, a new king finding his way, a possessive boyfriend, magic, and lots of delicious angst.
REVIEW:
We are now four books into Jocelynn Drake’s fantastic series, The Godstone Saga, and Drake has hit her stride. Wings of Fire is hands-down the best book in the series yet. These are not standalones – you must read them in order – and we are at the point where I’ll be refraining from any plot details in my reviews going forward to avoid spoilers and preserve your experience of the roller coaster highs and lows of this ever-expanding universe.
Wings of Fire is chock full of detailed world-building, intricate plot twists, new characters, and unusual settings. But most importantly, it digs deep into the characters of the four men that anchor all the events in this series – Caelan, Drayce, Rayne, and Eno. We also see more of the overwhelming, interfering gods jockeying for space in Caelan’s mind and how they interact not just with Caelan, but also with Rayne and, to a lesser extent, Drayce and Eno.
Relationships are the heart of this story, and what happens here is, at times, truly heartbreaking. Heed the trigger warnings that Drake prominently states at the beginning of the book and also at the start of the two chapters where the triggering events occur. Those events are tough to take but crucial to the story and the characters. Drake hammers home the point that weapons can come from the most unexpected places and in the most unexpected forms, and those wreak the most havoc. Careless wielding of words without thought as to their impact can have long-lasting repercussions never anticipated or intended. This is a lesson all four men learn, but Caelan most acutely.
It’s all part of the riveting character development Drake lays out here, and, surprisingly, we – as well as Caelan, Drayce, Rayne, and Eno – discover that even after all this time, they don’t know each other as well as they thought they did. There’s a lot of work to be done to solidify, and in some cases, rebuild trust even among four men who love each other deeply.
For a story like the one told in Wings of Fire – nuanced, introspective, emotional – Kale Williams is the perfect narrator. He disappears into the story, so all you hear are the characters themselves and all of their myriad emotions. Williams’ vocal performances are always intuitive, thoughtful, and expertly executed, and his performance on the Wings of Fire audiobook is a perfect example of that.
Williams’ voice is accessible and easy to listen to, but don’t let that fool you. There is nothing easy about the content Williams delivers in this performance. The effortlessness of it and the authenticity of the complex character portrayals he achieves are a credit to his exceptional skill as a vocal performer.
Wings of Fire is an audiobook I highly recommend. Just make sure you listen to the previous series audiobooks first; they are all enjoyable audiobooks in their own right.
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