An Ember in the Ashes
Ratings326
Average rating4.1
Literally, I am so incredibly shook by this book! I should probably take some time to process before writing my review, but I'm riding the high. This book moved me in ways I didn't think I could be moved by a YA fantasy. The storytelling in this book is impeccable. The whole experience of reading it was incredibly immersive. The imagery, the characters, the struggles, the pain... every bit of it was so well done. This is book 1 of 4 in the An Ember in the Ashes Series, and let me tell you, I will be downloading book 2 immediately after I write this review. @sabaa tells us the story of two individuals find themselves in desperate situations. One character craves freedom from a life of cruelty and the other longs for family. Both of these characters come together with a common goal of doing the right thing for the right reasons. Laia is a great female main character. Her longing and determination throughout the book are deeply felt. Elias... Oh Elias. This poor tortured and damaged man tugged on my heartstrings throughout the entire book. Reading his POV often created a visceral response from me. The way the author describes his desperation to be free and the things he has to do and witness stirred up all the feelings for me. I'm getting slow burn romance vibes, but we only get slight glimpses of that in this book... obviously hoping for more in future books! This book evoked so much emotion from me. I was angry one page, crying on others, cheering on my favorites the next. I love when a book checks all the boxes, and this one certainly did. There is a trials sequence, which has me on the edge of my seat with my heart pounding nearly every single trial. This is a YA Fantasy series, I personally think 16+ for themes and violence.
Impossible to put down. Fast paced and exciting, the stakes are always high so there was never a dull moment with this story. It was as action-packed as heart-wrenching. The writing was top tier and i was astonished by the brilliant storytelling and how each chapter was tailored to grip my attention.
As far as the characters go, they were all intriguing and multilayered. I enjoyed Elias' chapters more than Laia's, the internal conflicts he faces throughout the book interested more than the rebellious themes Laia's story conveyed, and besides, Helene alone is worth 5 stars.
I loved this book! It's amazing YA.
In a dystopian society, based on antique Rome, everyone against the empire is punished. Laia's brother is accused of treason and he is sent to prison. Laia joins the rebels and she infiltrates the military school to save him!
I loved the main characters and the plot. It was a little bit predictable (as any YA is) but it was sooo enjoyable.
CW: death, graphic murder, blood, death of loved ones, mention of rape, abuse, torture, slavery, self-harm, attempted rape.
no one talk to me for a week. I can't wait to read the rest of the series with ali.
CW: death, graphic murder, blood, death of loved ones, mention of rape, abuse, torture, slavery, self-harm, attempted rape.
no one talk to me for a week. I can't wait to read the rest of the series with ali.
AMAZING I LOVED IT OMG I COULDNT EVEN PUT THIS BOOKED DOWN I WALKED EVERYWHERE WITH THIS AND I MEAN EVERYWHERE CANT WAIT TO SEE WHAT GONNA HAPPEN IN A TORCH AGAINST THE NIGHT
There are many things that I like about this story. The dark setting with a resistance against an oppressive regime is intriguing. The beaten down nature of a subjugated people really does come through. Sabaa Tahir has a writing style that really evokes that oppression well. However, I do have several reservations against the story, particularly on the engagement I felt towards the characters.
The basic premise is great. The introduction with raid on a house by the authorities on a conquered people goes in dark places that I like. There is an overarching Romeo + Juliet story vibe as well - always a classic.
Unfortunately, I find the characters and their motivations somewhat unbelievable. The stupidity of some characters is really bizarre (how can someone who has been planning an escape for a decade end up acting suddenly so suspiciously right before its planned achievement?). I am hoping that the motivation of the Augers becomes clearer in later books, as they come across as really confused here.
I do love the introduction of some more arabic and middle eastern myth and legend - the use of efrit and djinn. There is a lot good here in the story. I will read the next couple of books to see where it goes - hopefully the characters will develop in a way that I find less jarring. Everything else here is good!
Maybe more of a 4.5 but I'm rounding up.
I've honestly been putting off this series for more than two years now (actually since I started blogging probably) because despite hearing great things about it, I've also heard it's intense and all the fans always say it involves a lot of tears. And I just wasn't ready to invest my time in another tear jerking intense world. But I finally decided to dive in and maybe I regret not reading it earlier, but I also think it found me at the perfect time.
If I have to choose a few words to describe the plot of this book, they would be fast paced, engaging and unputdownable. I just picked up the book on a whim and before I even realized, I was halfway done and then I went on to finish in a couple more hours. The story is very intense, the world is brutal, and I spent every chapter quite scared about what was gonna happen next. The author manages to create this very bleak atmosphere where there's very less hope, but I just clung to some glimmers of it, wishing it paid off. And wow it was totally worth it.
Laia is such a naive and sheltered character and it broke my heart to see how scared and confused she was a lot of the time, unsure of whom to trust and not knowing if she will survive but still not losing her focus on saving her brother. I admired her for keeping her wits about her even in such dire circumstances, but it was definitely towards the end that I realized there's so much more potential for her to be an awesome character.
Elias is a tortured soul and it was interesting to see him feel conflicted every step of the way. I still don't think he tried enough to do the right thing, but hopefully he'll get more opportunities to do that in the later books. And whatever problems I may have had with his character in usual times, I flew through the book so fast that I frankly didn't notice. I just found him quite sympathetic. I'm also not yet all in for the romance between both of them but I can see there is a bond and I'm definitely excited to see more conversations between them.
Helene is definitely the most fascinating character in this book but I'm not in her fan club yet. She is extremely capable and probably has had to be the best to achieve her position, and she is completely loyal to the causes (and persons) she believes in - which are highly admirable qualities - but she also has a ruthless streak and I'm much more interested to see where the author decides to take her character. But one thing I have to say, no one really treats her well and she totally deserves to punish them all for their atrocious behaviors.
There is also quite an ensemble of smaller characters and I have to commend the author because I remember most of them long after I finished the book, and that happens very less these days. What made it more interesting is that I could never guess the exact motivations of many of these side characters and while we do get some surprising reveals, I'm sure we'll get more. But my favorite of the lot has to be Izzi because she is so sweet and just wants a friend, and she may have suffered horribly since childhood but she has a heart of steel. I hope we'll see her again.
To conclude, I'm so glad my Stars and Sorcery book club chose this book as our BOTM forcing me to finally pick it up, because now I know what I was missing out. This is such a popular series that I don't think I need to say more to recommend it, but if you are someone who hasn't read it yet but loves intense and brutal fast paced fantasies, go check this out. I haven't completely made up my mind but I'm probably gearing up for a binge read of the next two. Let's see !!!!
I forgot how good this was. I really did. I don't understand how it was ever marketed as a standalone, when it's very clearly a build-up book. I'm so excited to move on to the next one, and I'm in love with Elias, and I have no coherent thoughts other than that I loved it?? It was brutal?? The trials are fucked up?? What's up with the fucking augors?? Yeah, I loved it.
Took me four years and constant restarts but I finally finished this book. Now it's off to the sequel!
“There are two kinds of guilt. The kind that's a burden and the kind that gives you purpose. Let your guilt be your fuel. Let it remind you of who you want to be. Draw a line in your mind. Never cross it again. You have a soul. It's damaged but it's there. Don't let them take it from you.”This book was very beautifully written, even though it had one of the worst book-verse ever. It shows the ugly, evil side of people, the amount of evil there is in the world, how less people care - how willingly they turn a blind-eye to everything, and how we all are surrounded by monsters in a cage; a cage from which we want to escape.Initially, I had this impression that the book [b:Children of Blood and Bone 34728667 Children of Blood and Bone (Legacy of Orïsha, #1) Tomi Adeyemi https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1516127989s/34728667.jpg 55911580] was a lot like this book. An oppressed class, siblings, characters knowing that what they're doing is wrong but they can't just walk away. Moral dilemma much? But after reading it, I can happily say that both books have very different plots and handled their own plots very well.The plot for this book was good, but the setting and the inhuman characters really irked me. Not that that's a bad thing. The author was going for that, so good job making me feel so many emotions.We have POVs from two characters: Laia and Elias.Laia started as a helpless girl who lived in the shadows, saw her brother get taken away while protecting her and their family, watched her family get murdered, and didn't have the courage to fight for them because of fear and ran away. All of these being normal reactions of a person being assaulted. What I really liked about Laia was the fact that towards the end, when she's in the same situation again, she says that she will fight unlike the way she ran away in the beginning. She's no more the same scared girl. Best character development ever.Elias' POV was a bit more irksome for me because he felt trapped in his own life and wanted to run away to be free of it, to live freely however he wished. Are you speaking for all humans here, Elias? Every chapter where Elias was forced to make a decision of staying or running away, I remember screaming, ‘Run away, it's not worth it! This place sucks. Go be free.' (Maybe because I feel trapped in a way too).Helene was only partially likeable because she trusted in the system more, than in her own best friend. Also, her disregard for life was pointed out very smartly using Elias' POV. Like, when she untied a Martial from a rope and his body falls down and Elias notices that but Hel didn't. How she didn't care about Scholars because they're slaves, but she still helped Laia. But then again, the ending explained her actions so I don't blame her. Doesn't mean you should still have swung the axe, woman. Not everyone's moral compass has the same setting. We got so many different types of characters in this book.Speaking of that, I should mention that I dislike the Commandant to the core. Stupid, worst mother ever! No words for her!!!List of things I liked:Starting from the end of the book,- The ending chapters where Elias didn't even care that he was being sentenced to death, because he was finally going to be free - this had to be my favorite chapter from the book. I loved his reactions in this chapter, the backstory for his deranged mother, and how he told her that she wasn't the one that will be freed by his death, it would be him.- Laia in the last chapters, where she points out that if she were the same person as she was in the beginning, she would have wished for someone to come and solve all her problems. But she was no longer that person and she would stand up for herself. Best character development again :D- Laia, Izzi and the Cook blowing up the place with sand bags was nice!- Augurs are assholes but I'm interested to learn more about them. If the NightBringer is the No-Name-King of the Djinn, then what does that make the Augurs?- Every chapter in which Elias thinks about how Blackcliff and the people there are evil-incarnate. Because I agree with you 200%.- The Moon festival dance was one fun thing that happened.- Laia and Izzi becoming friends.- The quote on top, that Laia says to Elias.- How there were more important things in this book to worry about than the love square! Thank you, dear author, for not making the characters indecisive just because they fell in love.
I didn't even know what this book was about when I picked it up, I didn't care. Honestly I picked it up because Hannah at aclockworkreader loves this series and the new American covers are MY JAM. I had no expectations from the book, but I knew that I'd previously been disappointed by YA books before. However, I picked up [b:Windwitch 29939390 Windwitch (The Witchlands, #2) Susan Dennard https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462296317s/29939390.jpg 41438285] by Susan Dennard a month or two ago and flew through the first two books. I absolutely loved them and decided I'd give another YA fantasy series a go. And I'm glad I did. The plot follows two main/point of view characters, Lais and Elias. One is getting ready to graduate a military academy and isn't sure he believes in the Empire any more, which he had been raised to fight for. The other, Laia, has entered into a desperate bargain with the resistance fighters from her country to spy on the Empire. Elias is a firm favourite character for me, he has conflicts within himself that you can really feel him trying to fight. I genuinely am really interested and invested in his character arc throughout this series. I would love to know more about him and his relationships with the people he grew up with. However, Laia wasn't as interesting for me. She had an intriguing background, but I didn't feel it was well developed. Information about her was dropped into the story when it felt convenient to the plot. I liked her section of the plot though, and I really think the second book was set up to give us a lot more of what I was missing from her story. For the world, the author managed a lot of world building without it feeling dense or like an “information dump”. I appreciate knowing enough about the world to make connections by myself but also getting to discover new things along the way. I'm a fan of the world and can't wait to see more. My only issue with the series at this point occurs when we're in Elias' point of view. That boy is horny, and needs to nip off for a wank between chapters. Honestly, it felt like he only viewed his best friend Helene and Laia as sex objects at points during the book. It was made especially weird because the book would then shake off the fact that he found Helene attractive (“she's my best friend”) and suddenly remember they have a connection outside of how much he'd like to bone her. it just felt jarring and childish, especially since the book tries to push Elias' respectful attitude towards woman as outside of the norm of the other male students he knows. I'd recommend this book for anyone who fancies some YA fantasy and enjoys a plot with multiple layers and moving parts. I also enjoyed it because it veered off the typical fantasy path of magic is evil/let's eradicate magic and the whole chosen one/only person with magical powers trope. I feel like I've seen that done to death.
5 star because it had everything
This book had absolutely everything.
Characters you genuinely cared about to a point where you care so much you struggle to read on at points! Some lovely and caring, others horrible and inconceivably cruel, all flawed and, as a result, very believable!
A storyline you constantly want to read the next chapter of to see where it is taking you, hoping what you thought was going to happen happens and then ether satisfyingly does or also satisfyingly takes a brilliant twist.
It's a book I feel the author could have kept on writing and I would have kept on reading. But I'm glad there's a sequel (and another book coming soon) as it allows me to break it up and get myself ready for the next installment as there's a lot of unanswered questions and little holes I want them to explore more!
I started this book a few years ago and then decided I was done reading YA series until they were complete. So I put it down, but did not forget about it. My problem with series is that I'd read one and then a few years later either have to attack the sequel blindly or reread the first one again. Faced with that, I generally just give up on the series. So, when I heard the 3rd (and I thought, final) book was coming out in a month, I started this series.
First, I really liked it. It loses a star for getting bogged down in romance a bit. For the most part it has a fast pace similar to Hunger Games and characters that I really care about. The world building is excellent, truly excellent. I need to know more about Augers, pronto.
Second, I mostly listened to this on audio and the narrators were fantastic. That made the book even better.
Third, I now see a 4th book in the works. Sigh.
Plan foiled.
3 stars! After pushing my way through this book, I've come to a few conclusions:
1. I both love and hate Helene
2. I find it impossible to pick who to ship with who
3. Book two is going to be INTERESTING...
And finally 4. That ending was so much better than I expected.
I had an awesome time Buddy Reading this with Priya and Desara.
When I read the cover synopsis for An Ember In The Ashes I have to be honest and say that I was a little cautious about this book. Set in a Romanesque setting where a group known as Martials rule over all the other people, especially stamping down on those known as the Scholars. I have never really read any novels set in this type of setting and wasn't sure how I would get on engaging with it.
From the very first chapter, this story is fast-paced and full of great characters. There is no holds barred as Laia, a young Scholar girl, has to stand by as her grandparents are butchered by a Mask, one of the Martials most fearsome kinds of warrior. Her brother is taken away to prison and she is left truly alone in the world with no one to turn to. She decides to approach the underground movement of resistance fighters where she makes a deal that will see them attempt to rescue her brother from prison in exchange for her going undercover at Blackcliff the training school for Martial soldiers and spying on its Commandant, the cruel woman in charge of the school.
Wrapped alongside Laia's story we have that of Elias, a young warrior, and son of Blackcliff's Commandant who is preparing to graduate from the school and take on a new role as one of the Masks who killed Laia's grandparents. Elia's is an amazing character as he is struggling with the regime under which he has been raised, he hates the cruelty he sees all around him and wants nothing more than to run as far as he can from his future. When he meets Laia their story's are destined to intertwine as they both fight against the brutality of the world in which they have been raised.
This book was incredible, the two lead characters were some of the most engaging I have had the joy of reading. Elias especially was amazing, the way in which we join him on his journey to try and escape the world in which he is destined to live. The internal struggles he goes through and how he is unable to share this with anyone around him as each an every person is indoctrinated by the brutality of the school that has shaped their every view. You root for him at every turn and become so invested in his story that you are left distraught when the book ends.
This book itself is full of a full range of incredible characters. There is the dark and cruel Commandant whose actions are reprehensible and wicked. The Helene the best friend of Elias who is fiercely loyal to her best friend and yet is unwilling to betray her empire even though she has fallen in love with Elias. The wonderful Kitchen Girl and the Cook whose friendship will help Laia to survive. Each and every one you care deeply about, when things get dark in the second half of this book and Sabaa Tahir starts to sacrifice characters you are distraught and it hurts.
I loved the Augur's and the concept that they have a long-term vision about the future of the world in which this book is set and they are manipulating everyone into position so the future can play out. The trials in this book which are held to find the next Emperor made it really exciting and gave this book lots of action which felt like they had really high stakes. We hope that their vision is one that will last beyond this book and into the next two in the series as the ending of this one leaves lots of questions unanswered and lots of room for things to grow in A Torch In The Night.
There have been few books that have had me so excited as this one, none that have had me shouting at the pages and cheering the characters on so much as this one. I could not put this one down. I read over 200 pages very quickly in one day. I cannot wait to read book 2, and with Book 3 due for release in early summer it is a series I will be finishing this year for sure.
Excellent book! The writing, the pace, the world!!! A++++ Highly recommend!