Exciting start to what I hope will be a grand adventure. This book was a lot of world building and set up for the rest of the series. We got a taste of the different characters and the excitement to come. I look forward to reading what comes next.

“Being a scholar doesn’t mean I know everything or even many things, it means I’m painfully aware of how little I know”

Storyline: 4
The story was compelling and well paced, there are characters and events that appear to be well placed foreshadowing (I hope).
Enjoyment: 4
I really like led this book, enough so that by the end I was glad that there was a snippet of the next book, because I was ready to dive in to the rest of the series!
Readability: 3.5
Easy to follow. I hope there is an additional editorial pass before final publication as there were some spelling and grammatical errors that pulled me from the story. Also, overuse of exclamation points outside of dialogue.

Thank you to Netgalley and Melanie Moschella for the ARC.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this book!

I've been reading a lot of "rider" stories recently (mostly dragons) and this one finally gave me what I wanted! Raeken aren't dragons, technically, but they are mostly dragons... but feathery! The feathers do actually make an exciting difference for me visually.

The story kept me engaged the whole way through and the protag, Meera's, relationship with the captive dragon/ride pair was heartfelt and well realized. You don't get to see a lot of the wider setting outside of Meera's book learning, as her view of the world starts off fairly small, but it was enough for me to want to hear more. The bond between the Raek and Meera felt real and earned, even though most of it was wordless on one side. I felt for Meera's sense of loneliness throughout the story and I honestly can't wait for the series to be released so I can find out where her development goes.

There's a lot of what you could call "hurt/comfort" in this story which I ate up. Meera is caring, but not in a way that she feels boring or one note. She's an interesting mixture of thoughtful and impulsive, and the book stays close to her emotional journey. which really worked for me. Even when she was being a bit silly, you could feel where she was coming from. Her victories feel earned.

Also, Raek are very cool fantasy creatures, and the rendering on the cover is beautiful. Cerun sounds like such a pretty boy and I loved him. (Cerun is the Raek... I guess his rider is okay too.)

I feel like I'm descending into rambles, but I was just quite happy with this. The only part I didn't like she when she felt ambivalently hot for the King (girl, I CANNOT relate) but that's just me. Thankfully, that wasn't lingered on too much.

Meera Hardship is a lonely kitchen maid, and when a very intimidating creature (the raek) is imprisoned at the castle she volunteers to feed it - which kicks off an adventure of spying, interrogating and treason!

Once this book found its rhythm I couldn't put it down. I really like the premise/concept of the book, and I like where the plot is going. (Super excited to read the next one.) The pacing is well done, once I was through the first few chapters it settled into a solid medium pace. I appreciated that the info dumps were very limited, we're learning about the world as we go.

I did find the first few chapters difficult to get through, the pacing was a little off and I didn't feel like they ultimately added much to the story overall. I also found the dialogue between characters a little stiff at times. But overall I still very much enjoyed reading this, I think this series has a lot of potential and I can't wait to see where it goes! If you're a fan of Fourth Wing, I think you would enjoy this.

Very exciting note: The whole series is releasing on the same day. If you're like me and struggle to find the line between supporting an author and not torturing yourself with cliffhangers... this is a totally bingeable series.

Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for the early readers copy!