I’m not sure how to review this book. There were some things that I really liked about it, and some things that were not as successful for me.

First off, this books needs some content warnings for death, because there is a lot of it: Death of a parent, death of a loved one, suicide, death of an animal (not a pet), and several near death experiences. Death is a central plot point, which is one of the things that didn’t work for me so much. It seemed like Annie was pretty much obsessed with death.

Annie and Pete’s dads (and Annie’s Gigi) gave them a lot of freedom for the amount of risk taking that they do, and have done their whole lives. The bulk of the story takes place the summer before their senior year in high school, but there are a lot of time jumps to the past that can be a little disorienting at times.

The story is told first person from Annie’s POV. So we don’t see what’s going on in Pete’s mind and just have to take her word for it, but it does seem legit.

Here is what I liked:

Annie and Pete’s friendship, which has lasted since they met in elementary school. They are the best of friends and their dads refer to them as soulmates. Even though Annie has a crush on Pete, she’s never acted on it and it hasn’t affected their friendship. Neither has the appearance of Pete’s girlfriend.
Preet’s (Pete’s girlfriend) complete acceptance of Annie in his life. And her willingness to do things with them, and to let them do the things she doesn’t enjoy without her. No jealousy on her part is evident (there is a bit on Annie’s).
Pete’s total assurance in his own masculinity and love of unicorns and rainbows. Seriously, everything this boy owns is covered in unicorns, including his underwear. (His love of unicorns is mentioned A LOT).
I still don’t know how I feel about the ending. While it does feel authentic for the story, it doesn’t seem like there is a lot of character growth

Disclaimer: I received an eARC of this book through Net Galley on behalf of the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Navigating themes of grief and the unforgiving brutality of nature and life, Wildfire follows Annie and Pete, two inseparable best friends, as they embark on a perilous and emotionally charged journey through the woods, facing not only the dangers of the wilderness but also the complexities of their evolving feelings for each other. Evoking both a sense of wonder and melancholy, this book juxtaposes the beauty of the wilderness with the brutality of life's unpredictable events, creating a complex emotional landscape. It started out slow but slowly built its pace as the novel went on and, while I wasn’t particularly blown away by this novel, I was still able to find beauty and enjoyment in it and I have no doubt there are readers who would really love and relate to it.

Thank you Netgalley for letting me read and review this ya book. This book is similar to Into the Wild and The Serpent King. It is about Annie and Pete, who go on a dangerous hike through the woods. I loved the atmosphere of the book, I felt like I was in the woods and mountains with Annie and Pete. I enjoyed the writing style and the plot was intriguing mostly.

I have elected not to read and review this book due to time constraints. Thank you for the opportunity.

Thanks for the chance to read this book. There were some tropes that stood out, like trying too hard to have every single aspect of 'good rep' involved, but it was a good story overall.

Thank you so much for allowing me to read and review your titles.
I do appreciate it and continue to review books that I get the chance to read.
Thanks again!

An emotional and gripping read, but a bit too much language for me. :) It distracted me from the emotional impact of the author's writing. The rest of the book, however, was written in a style that I loved--almost staccato-like, fast-paced, and held almost a nostalgic feel throughout that made me yearn for lemonade and the sticky days of summer.

Into the Wild meets The Serpent King in this story about Annie and Pete, two best friends on a dangerous and emotional trek through the woods.

I went into reading this book thinking it was something completely …different. I didn't hate the story, but I didn't love it either. The story deals with grief, and left me feeling very meh.

CW: Death and bereavement, road traffic accident, suicide, sepsis.

The synopsis makes it sound like this is a book about friendship and love and hiking adventures. This is however a book that really deals primarily with death. So for starters it should have come with content/trigger warnings. The other massive issue is that the book deals really badly with all these issues. Stories don't have to be a morality trip but they do need to be approached responsibly. The book was one long series of appalling things happening but handled with a "oops well I guess that was too bad" as we move on to the next disaster.

Who is the audience meant to be? Who is the book written for? Teenagers who have experienced bereavement? Because it certainly would not be a healing read for them. Teenagers who have a safe, comfortable life but who want to be entertained by the trauma of others? Not sure it even fulfils this because it was hard to see any purpose to the series of catastrophes depicted. There were no real learning points. There was no positive character growth. All I could see was the character's problems and trauma getting worse, and getting brushed aside as a coping strategy. Not the message to be imparted to teenagers about how to navigate trauma.

I would not recommend the book to anybody unfortunately.

A beautiful, different read that moved me. New favorite, 5 stars.

This book hit me like a ton of bricks. I never expected to love it as much as I did. But I couldn't help it - Pete and Annie's story absolutely moved me.

This author writes beautifully. Her teenagers are actual teenagers who are still witty, wonderful, smart and in their minds, invincible.

I cried, I will admit, and I was really moved by this beautiful read. I can't wait for more from this refreshing voice.

Would I recommend this book? I would, but PLEASE be careful. There are so so many trigger warnings here. It's beautiful, but really only meant for a reader with a stronger stomach who wants something tragically stunning.

This book was definitely intense and strange. Not what I was expecting, I was a bit taken aback by this book. I still don't know if I liked it or not.

this was a really enjoyable read, the characters were great and I really enjoyed reading their journey. It had a lot of emotions and I throughly enjoyed reading this.

I went into this thinking that it would focus more on the main character and her unrequited love for her friend, but it took a different turn and ended up dealing with the loss of a loved one. I enjoyed this for the most part.

*I WAS PROVIDED A DIGITAL GALLEY VIA NETGALLEY IN RETURN FOR MY HONEST REVIEW. THIS DOES NOT AFFECT MY OPINION*

I'm currently listening to Take It All Away by Red because I'm still feeling so many emotions after reading this book and can't properly deal with them.

Carrie Mac is a fantastic writer. Her writing style was what initially drew me into this story, and it didn't let up throughout any of the book. She has a way of making the emotions of the story so realistic and true that you can't help but feel them yourself.

I will say now, that the characters were amazingly developed. I didn't see one character, main or side, slacking in any department. And that's really great, y'know? Because you don't see that too often. 

Wildfire is a book I can confidently say explores what it is to be a teenager in today's day and age. Now, I'm sure not all teenagers have permission to go camping and hiking on their own for a week, but in the circumstances that Annie and Pete were in, it was realistic and believable. Not to mention, everything that was brought about in this book was something I was able to understand or relate to.


After reading this book, I took a moment to explore the bad reviews on Goodreads to understand why people weren't liking this book. Something I commonly saw was that people were saying this book was written in a weird format and that the main character was supposed to represent a strong and abled woman. And to that, I have to say what is so bad about that? Isn't that what we want in YA books?

I wish I could be like Annie in that sense. She is someone who has lost and loved over and over and over. Yet she continues to go. She may not have done everything people expected of her, but can't we say that's exactly what it's like to be a teenager? You can't deal with everything all at once. You can't just go along with what everyone wants from you. You have to find and carve your own path, your own way, and that is exactly what I was able to gain from this book.

The only thing I didn't like about this book was that there were a few instances where Annie's jealousy for Preet extended into overbearing hate, but otherwise, it didn't get much past jealousy.

For that, I rate this book 4.75 stars. I loved this book, and I will be picking up the final copy as soon as I physically can. I look forward to reading more from Mac in the future and can't wait to see what beautiful tragedy she writes next.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for this early copy!

Did not finish - I did not connect with the plot or the writing and decided to put it down.

this book was way heavier than I was expecting. i thought it would be about unrequited love and it was but it also wasn't really. This book didn't capture me in the beginning but as time passed is lowly began to enjoy the book some more. This book mainly deals with grief and the loss of a loved one so if that is triggering I would advise proceeding with caution. I enjoyed this book but I have enjoyed other novels about grief mainly because of what i thought it was going to be vs. what it was. I was in the mood for a campy happy semi-predictable friends to lovers romance and... that's not this book at all. This book was sad and thoughtful and overall a story I enjoyed. I will be keeping my eye out on what this author puts out in the future.

TW: death of a loved one, death of an animal, wildfires, infection + illness
(trigger warnings taken from Chelsea from Chelseadollingreads)

(from Goodreads) I cried through parts of this book, it was that emotional. The tagline that it's "'Into the Wild' meets 'The Serpent King'" really held true for me. I love books about close friendships and adventures, and this one did not disappoint. Although I was mad at the author about something, it was so well-written and impressive I've decided to read more by Carrie Mac.

3.5 stars.

After reading through this book, I can't help but feel like I've been lied to. I was expecting it to be fluff fluff but it turns out to be hard-hitting more than anything (at least to me since I rarely read that genre).

The book focuses a lot on the hiking adventure, the past and death rather than the romance. Though I enjoyed it, I wish it was actually focused on the romance.

Now I'm a fan of friends to lovers and that was my expectations, but the book decided to rip my heart to shreds! I don't mind what happened in that big event but I hate how it happened. It was more due to negligence rather than reason. Annie in the end managed to do what she needed to do after it was too late.

Overall, I was really shocked and I bawled my eyes out while reading the book. This was a good read despite it being the opposite of my expectations (though I still wished it went the predictable route of romance) and I understand the emotional journey Annie had to take to continue moving on her life after everything that happened.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with the digital copy for an honest review.

This was not the book I was expecting, but I absolutely loved it! The friendship between Annie and Pete is perfection, and I loved the concept of the hike to help Annie find herself again. I'm not a big outdoorsy person, but this really drew me in.

The ending literally ripped my heart out. I can't believe it...

Plus, the cover is GORGEOUS.

This book wasn't horrible but I found myself not likeing it very much. I feel as though the characters were only okay and I didn't really find myself connecting with them. I found myself struggling to finsh the book.