A Fire in the Flesh
Flesh and Fire #3
By Jennifer L. Armentrout
TheStory
After the utter betrayal at the end of A Light in the Flame, Sera and Nyktos have been captured by Kolis (not a spoiler if you read A Light in the Flame, which if you didn’t, why are you reading this review of the following book?). Kolis believes Sera to be his reincarnated lost love, Sotoria, whom Kolis actually caused to commit suicide by scaring the ever-loving bajesus out of her many years ago (also because Kolis’ love for Sotoria was unrequited). Sera decides to play the part of Sotoria in order to buy herself time and keep Kolis’ wrath at bay.
Meanwhile, Sera’s Culling is still looming on the horizon, giving her a limited amount of time to actually survive this and complete her Culling without dying in the process. Sera’s inability to survive the Culling not only endangers her but the entire realm.
During her time in captivity, Sera begins to question her own duty as well as the very fabric of the realms. She learns about Kolis’ true nature and his threat to the realms while simultaneously discovering truths about her own existence. While Nyktos struggles to save Sera and ascend as the Primal of Life (two feats which are gravely hindered by his own captivity).
TheReview
First things first, I HATE the captivity trope. If you can even call it a trope. I do not understand why so many fantasy series feel the need for the MCs to fall prey to captivity. It drives me absolutely nuts. And this captivity? THIS ONE?! Lasts foreverrrrrr. Stop it. Along the same lines, Nyktos goes into stasis for a huge portion of the book, too. So, where is my romance?! Where is my love?! Where is my slow burn?! It can’t slow burn if they aren’t even together for the majority of the book! It can’t burn, period.
It seriously felt like the point of this entire book was to show readers how atrocious Kolis is. Which we knew already. We don’t need hundreds of pages of captivity, torture, and general awfulness to get the idea. My goodness.
When she finally gets her revenge (2/3 of the way through the book) it is glorious. But still… 400 pages, for a girl boss moment? Eh. Not the vibe. That being said, the last 200 pages were phenomenal. There is a glorious (and lengthy) spicy scene. Also, no cliff hanger at the end.
Honestly, this book was just not a vibe for me. Almost the entire thing was about Kolis (the actual VILLIAN), captivity, and the MCs were hardly even together the entire time. Frankly, this book ended my interest in the series. So, sorry to everyone who is just completely obsessed with my reviews because of how life altering they are, I will not be continuing to review the series as I won’t be reading it.
TheRating
Storyline: 1/5
Characters: 2/5
World Building: N/A
Spice: 1/5
Writing: 2/5
Overall: 2/5
Flesh and Fire Series
A Shadow in the Ember
Flesh and Fire #1
A Light in the Flame
Flesh and Fire #2
A Fire in the Flesh
Flesh and Fire #3
Born of Blood and Ash
Flesh and Fire #4