"Of Fire and Stars" by Audrey Coulthurst Review

*Spoiler Free* I know it seems like I a giving away plot points but nothing I discuss here is anything you couldn't get from reading the back of the book.

My Rating: 3.5/5

I have so many thoughts about this book!

This book follows our two main chanters, Denna and Mare, as they each struggle with big decisions regarding their future. Denna is the princess of the northern kingdom of Havemont and she is engaged by arranged marriage to the Prince of Mynaria, a Kingdom of Horselords. She possesses an Affinity, or magical gift, for fire which is dangerous not only because she cannot fully control it but because the kingdom which she is to rule as Queen has outlawed magic. Mare is the princess of Mynaria and sister to Denna's fiance. She is rebelling against her station, refusing to play the games at court and sneaking out into the city as much as possible. She has no desire to wed or rule and would be happy being a Horse trainer for the rest of her life. During Denna's time at court the two become close and end up falling in love with each other which threatens the alliance between Havemont and Mynaria. They have to chose between love and duty. Also, Denna's gift becomes a curse as chaos at court causes a "witch hunt" for magic users.

The premise of the book had me 100% on board! Horses? Check. Magic? Check. Female leads? Check. F/F love story? Check. Unfortunately, this book left a lot to be desired. It wasn't bad! Not at all! But with a set up like that I was expecting so much more than what I was given. So here is what I liked and didn't like:

LIKED:

1. The Love story.

The love story between Denna and Mare is built beautifully and is easily the best part of this book. It includes the Hate to Love trope which I enjoy and avoids the Insta-Love trope that I hate. The relationship feels real and I believed that these characters genuinely loved each other. It is sweet and emotional and I was rooting for them the whole time.

2. The Equestrian Elements.

As an equestrian myself, I loved that Audrey has a working knowledge of horses and it defiantly shows in her writing. It was fun to read about Mare's work with horses written by someone who knows her stuff. It also made the Mynarian Horselords much more believable as people and as a kingdom. Sometimes the horse jokes were a bit much and came off a little cheesy. Especially when Mare and Thandi are fighting about something really important and she makes a horse reference to insult him. It was such a compelling scene until that moment which threw me out of it a bit. Otherwise, I loved this element!

3. All the Badass Ladies!

There are so many cool women in this story! Seriously, they are everywhere. And they aren't just ladies of the court either. The head of the kings guard is a woman. The King's most trusted adviser is a woman. Denna as the future Queen is treated with just as much respect and authority as Thandi as future King. In fact, Denna's sister is Queen of Havemont without a King by her side. The King is frustrated with Mare because she could be a wonderful queen, although she doesn't want to be. Even the enemy empire is run by a Queen, not a King. The best part is that this is treated normally. None of the characters go on and on about the fact that there are women in power. It is just accepted as a normal part of society and gender is not an issue. The captain of the guard is brave and loyal and incredibly good at her job and she happens to be a woman. No big deal. I love that!

4. The Ending.

Just, the whole thing.

DISLIKE:

1. The World-building.

The World Building left a lot to be desired. By the end of the book we don't know much about the world. There is a northern kingdom, a southern kingdom and the "bad" kingdom to the east; and although we learn a bit about each one, we don't learn enough about them to make this feel like a real world. Even Mynaria, which is where the entirety of this story takes place, isn't build enough. We learn a lot about the Horse culture and that they are fearful of magic, but we don't learn much else. There weren't many descriptions of how things looked. I have an active imagination so I could fill in the gaps, but so much time is spent describing other things that there could have been more time spent on building the world in which our characters live.

2. The Magic System.

The magic system isn't really explained. They mention at one point that people with magic have been blessed by the gods, particularly the god that governs that element. So Denna's fire gift would have been a blessing from the fire god. But it isn't really clear if this is just what people believe or is really where the magic comes from. It is mentioned that there are people who have Affinities in the southern tribes and they do not worship the gods, so I am not sure how that works. There is also hardly any magic in this story besides Denna's gift, which isn't used much. Denna spends most of her time trying to control her gift because she fears it which means we don't get to see a magic wielding badass that I wanted to see. Later we meet another magical character but he doesn't answer many of our questions regarding the system either. It was such a lacking part in the story and I really wanted more from it. Honestly, this book doesn't feel like a fantasy book because there is so little magic in it. There is so much attention paid to other things that could have been spent here.

3. The Plot.

This book is slow. Really slow. It picks up about halfway through but there were times when I sat it down for a few days and didn't really feel an overwhelming desire to finish it. If it wasn't for the love story it would have taken me longer to finish it. For a plot that sounds so interesting and has so much potential, the plot we get just drags. So much time is spend on the equestrian parts or the expectations of Denna at court or Mare going to the pub and trying to get information that I found myself thinking "Ok. Let's get on with it!". I am an equestrian and I think the equestrian stuff got too much attention in this book. I love horses but they weren't the focus of the story. They were supposed to be a background element to build the world at give our two main characters an excuse to spend time together but so much time was focused here that the magic, the world-building and the plot suffered.

4. All the secondary characters.

I wanted more from Thandi! Thandi is Denna's fiance and he takes such a back seat that we don't know anything about him. Nothing. He likes to ride horses. So does everyone in Mynaria. I wanted him rounded out so that we could feel the weight of Denna's decision. Should she follow her heart or do her duty? I didn't want a cliche premise like Thandi being a jerk the whole time or mean, and luckily we didn't get that. He is a bit stuck on himself and he doesn't really care about Denna (to be fair she doesn't really care about him either) but I would have liked to see more. Make him likable and charming so that if Denna chooses to become Queen her life isn't full of misery and it makes the choice less black and white. Or make him like Denna so we care about Thandi's feelings when Denna and Mare fall in love. The way this was built made me not care at all about Thandi. I didn't hate him or like him enough to care. There were also many other secondary characters who remained so two denominational. We didn't know any of them enough to care. We "care" about them because we are supposed to because the story tells us so but they're not compelling. I would have loved fleshed out characters. Again, so much unrealized potential here.

I gave this book 3.5/5 because the elements done well are done really well. I love out leading ladies and their story is so sweet. However, the problems I had with it were too big to be ignored. My rating isn't lower because none of the problems I had with this book were ideological or offensive, which is usually what I reserve my 1 and 2 star ratings for. I believe a lot of my problems came from my expectations. I wanted it to be more than it was and I was disappointed. So if you go into this book with that in mind, I think you can really enjoy it. Just take it for what it is and it is a cute read.

Charlie