A couple of years ago I was looking for a new genre and was getting a lot of reviews on my timelines about Fantasy Fiction, and mainly Academy Fantasy fiction.
Having read a few of these over the last few years I found that they fall into two camps for me. Either really good, or really awful.
Unbound falls firmly in the first category, and not only that it sits right at the top.
One of the reviews I’ve seen stated that it deserves to be read a much as Rebecca Yarros’ Fourth Wing, I couldn’t agree more.
Nessa Thorne enters the Confluence Academy as a volunteer, and volunteers are seen as the lowest of the low.
The Academy trains people to fight for the Empire against the Red Kingdom.
Students are placed into one of four affinities depending on their mystical skills. Fire, Earth, Water, and Air.
The problem for Nessa is that she is Unbound, she has no particular affinity, but she can call on all four.
This makes her very dangerous, the problem is, is that she is totally naive to the fact her skills are sought after by all of the powerful people in the academy. It also means that those that can’t have her as a weapon need her dead.
Nessa pretends to be a water bound, but her close friends soon realise she is more than a water channeller. Unlikely alliances and friendships are formed.
A close bond with a Fire has everybody talking. His affinities want her dead but not as much as some of her own affinity do.
But who, or what is the driving force.
As with all the books I’ve read in this genre nobody is what they first seem to be.
It’s a mystery in itself as to who is really a friend and ally, and who are really deadly enemies.
And just like many other books in the genre there’s a nasty twist at the end, leaving a nice cliff hanger for the second book in the series, Unveiled.
But as much as this book follows a familiar format, and as much as I wasn’t surprised by the twists at the end, the journey to get to the last paragraph was a great read.
Yes the characters will be familiar, yes the story follows the usual template, but the fact that I enjoyed it so much speaks volumes for the quality of the story telling.
Pages: 576. Publisher: Mountain Leopard Press. Audiobook length: 22 hours 3 minutes. Narrator: Rachel Leblang
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