Romantasy & Fourth Wing with Sarah Skilton

Short Description

Some call it Romantasy, some call it Dragon Corn (except replace the C with a P). Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is hotter than dragon’s breath, and so of course we have to see if we can figure out why it’s so popular. Sarah Skilton joins me to discuss “love triangles,” indescribable pain that we would actually like described, War College, and how…hot…Xaden…is. Also, is Fourth Wing enjoyable for people with romance or fantasy genre competence? Listen…or die.

Tags

scifi and fantasy romance, romance novel discussion

Show Notes

Some call it Romantasy, some call it Dragon Corn (except replace the C with a P). Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is hotter than dragon’s breath, and so of course we have to see if we can figure out why it’s so popular. Sarah Skilton joins me to discuss “love triangles,” indescribable pain that we would actually like described, War College, and how…hot…Xaden…is. Also, is Fourth Wing enjoyable for people with romance or fantasy genre competence? Listen…or die.

Discussed: Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros

Guest: Sarah Skilton

Website: www.sarahskilton.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/skiltongram/

Hollywood Ending by Tash Skilton: https://bookshop.org/p/books/hollywood-ending-tash-skilton/15806212?ean=9781496730671

Transcript

Andrea Martucci: [00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to Shelf Love, a podcast romance novels and how they reflect, explore, challenge, and shape desire. I'm your host, Andrea Martucci, and on this episode, I'm joined by author Sarah Skilton discuss Fourth Wing and Romantasy.

Sarah, thank you for joining us. How are you?

Sarah Skilton: I'm very good. Thank you for having me. I was mentioning earlier, this is such a treat for me because I've listened to just about every episode and it really got me through the pandemic and beyond. I was not a podcast listener until the pandemic and then I really relied on it. So you've seen me through some things.

Andrea Martucci: Well, Thank you. I mean, you're welcome. Uh, So Sarah, who are you in the context of the book space?

Sarah Skilton: So I have written young adult novels with martial arts and noir tinged YA mysteries, as well as rom coms. Fame, treatises, and road trip style comedies, and though I have not written any romantasy, I do enjoy reading it, and I do enjoy also reading, I guess what they would just call straight fantasy, not in terms of the characters, but in terms of, okay, this has a lot of world building, this has a lot of language that has been created specifically for this book.

So I feel as though I come to this discussion with an enjoyment of fantasy and romantasy, but with no actual experience writing it myself. So I can put on my critical hat right now, but people are also free to, take some of my thoughts with a grain of salt as the romantasy is still somewhat new for me.

Andrea Martucci: And I think the two of us are maybe coming into Fourth Wing, not necessarily as the target audience but curious about it,

Sarah Skilton: Yes

Andrea Martucci: because of maybe our enjoyment of things like this or adjacent to it and then seeing that there was a fuss and wondering what all the fuss was about. Yes, that definitely tracks for me.

Sarah Skilton: Yes, that definitely tracks for me.

Andrea Martucci: So Fourth Wing is by Rebecca Yarros and it is a huge best selling book at this point.

Did it come out in 2023 initially?

Sarah Skilton: I think the summer of 23, or spring of 23, and then the next one came out in the fall. So it was a rapid release, I feel with the first two.

Andrea Martucci: so it's been a big thing, I don't want to say it was the start of this big romantasy push, because I think Sarah J Maas has been doing that essentially for a bit, but I do think it kicked off maybe even more fervor about romantasy like it feels like maybe about a year ago that's when everybody started talking about romantasy as the next big thing. I certainly avoided it for a really long time because I was like I cannot imagine that the hype is worth it because we've been through this before but then I saw that you were reading it And I was like well, is it good?

So yeah. why did, you pick it up?

Sarah Skilton: And then I like, entered into a [00:03:00] screed in your DMs. Okay, so not only was I skeptical, I was actively avoiding it for months, maybe even a year. And this is so petty, but this was my reasoning. So I'd seen it all over Instagram. And the tag the cover really bugged me. So I'm a big Game of Thrones fan, although I haven't watched House of the Dragon, I liked the OG Game of Thrones and I loved those books, and I've read those multiple times, and Cersei has this iconic line that everyone quotes, and that's the central theme of the entire series, which is, "when you play the Game of Thrones, you win or you die."

Now, on fourth wing, right above the title, it says, "fly dot, dot, dot or die." And I was like, seriously? That's what you've reduced this to? And then on the back of the blurb, it strengthens it slightly by saying, "graduate, dot dot dot, or die." And I was just like, I'm so annoyed by this, I'm not even going to pick it up.

But I kept hearing about it. And one of my trusted friends who is also an author and who does write romantasy said that yes, it's derivative, but when it becomes its own thing, it's unputdownable. And I was like, okay, all right, you've gotten me at least curious enough that I do want to know what people are talking about.

And, partly because of this podcast, I do like to be in the discourse and find out what's popular and why. It's useful to know for me as a writer what is really attracting people? What's grabbing attention right now? Does it work for me? Do I understand what it is that was so successful or engaging about this?

So I put it on hold at the library. And at first it said, there are like 80 or 100 people ahead of you, and I was like, shoot, if each person takes it out for the maximum that they're allowed to have it, it'll be like three weeks times 80.

But then I did something I sometimes do. Pro tip, look for the large print version. If your has the large print version, most people don't know to look for that one, and it'll come in much faster. So this one came in in about three months, I would say, two or three months.

Now, that also caused its own problems, which we'll get into, because reading it in large print was a very odd situation for me that may have affected a little bit of my initial thoughts on the book.

But, yeah, I'd been curious, I'd seen it all over social media, and I finally gave in, even though I was annoyed by like, the marketing.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. Yeah. And it's a hefty book. So I have the hardcover edition. It's 500 pages of the actual book itself before some end matter. And and it's a big boy. So Sarah, before we start getting into, and we are going to get into why we think people like this and how we liked it, what is Fourth Wing actually about?

Sarah Skilton: Okay, according to the backmatter, there is no romance in particular in this story, even though I would say that is probably what people love the best about it, is the romance. [00:06:00] But according to the back matter, we have this 20 year old young woman named Violet, who is the daughter of a general. In this pseudo medieval, I don't know where, when this takes place, but there's dragons and there's people coexisting and they are reliant on one another for various things in this war.

This war has been going on for 900 years. And when people of Violet's age leave their previous high school or high school equivalent, they can go to the war college.

Andrea Martucci: Sarah, it is hilarious that not one mention in this book of what life is like is there schooling before war college? We don't know.

Sarah Skilton: It doesn't matter. Every once in a while, they'll say, this person's been training for 12 years for this day, this one day where they pledge either to become a scribe, which was what Violet originally intended until she was rerouted by her mother, the general, into becoming a dragon rider.

So you can choose to be a scribe, you can choose to be a dragon rider, or you can attempt to become a dragon rider, the highest of the elite in this war college, or you can be like a medicine person. I don't even remember what the other ones were.

Andrea Martucci: I think it's, I think just healer and then infantry. Yeah.

Sarah Skilton: Which, we're going to get into this, but the people who want to become the Dragon Riders are at risk from the moment they declare their interest because they have to walk across this parapet and they might just fall to their death at any moment. Another rider who just doesn't like them or thinks they're weak might push them off, or the dragons could kill them, or the training is just so vicious, etc.

But instead of being like, oh, you might not be cut out for this, why don't you join our infantry? You were brave enough to volunteer for this squadron. You clearly love the your country of, I don't even remember Navarre. You love Navarre. You're willing to die for your country. We could really use you in the infantry. Wow.

They're just like, Oh, you're dead too bad. You chose wrong. And yeah, so it's deadly from the beginning. And she's off to war college along with thousands of other 20 year olds. And she's going to learn how to ride a dragon, bond with a dragon, channel energy and strength from the dragon.

And also somehow come up with her own powers that will be unique to her personality.

What is her personality, you ask? She wanted to be a scribe. So she's bookish, which I think right away readers are like, Oh, like me. I like books. Violet likes books. She wanted to do books for her job. So we immediately love her and she's an underdog.

So she's It's been rerouted from Librarian to Dragonrider and what the backstory does not mention anything about is this super, super hottie who wants to kill her because she is the general's daughter. And he is a huge portion of the book and they have their [00:09:00] romantic feverish entanglement, but you wouldn't know that from the summary.

So the summary just keeps it strictly War College and that graduate or die, there's one way out of this college.

Andrea Martucci: Now, hilariously, I think your back of the book , it's definitely different from what is on the back of my book, which seems to be like an excerpt but when I look at the inside cover, and there's more of a synopsis, we definitely get Xaden Riorson.

Sarah Skilton: Interesting. Okay. So he appearance on yours, but not to the people who have bad eyesight.

Andrea Martucci: No, No, I wonder is the back of the cover text big and did it get cut for space? I wonder the, what's the last sentence?

Sarah Skilton: There are only two ways out. Graduate or die.

Andrea Martucci: Okay, that is the last sentence of mine, but it seems like they cut out some paragraphs in between. Okay, you're gonna have take a picture and send it to me, and I'm literally gonna, I'm gonna line by line compare, because I think it's hilarious, I'm just imagining whoever's job it was make the too long back cover copy fit on the large print edition. And they were like, we don't need this.

Sarah Skilton: Right Well, apparently they cut out Xaden, which I was shocked about, because I assumed that the main draw for the romantasy minded was Xaden, so yeah, I was pretty shocked. It almost felt like they were trying to trick people into reading one type of book when it was actually a different type of book, but that might've been the large print version.

Andrea Martucci: And I perceive the target market of this book to be, 20 something women for the most part.

But interestingly, the first person who really said anything to me about this book was, I was on a work call with somebody, and they were like, Oh, I was sick and, my sister or something recommended this dragon porn book. And, and I read the whole thing and I loved it. And this happened because I was like, Oh, I have a romance novel podcast. so, started talking about this.

So this is like my first encounter with it is Dragon Porn. I was like, oh, I haven't really heard of it I'm like, I'm like, I feel like really out of the loop here.

And that person is I would say maybe closer to my age. So not 20 something.

I do think it's very interesting that also it feels like this is the book that a lot of people are picking up when they're like, okay I'm sick or I'm on vacation or I'm, I just need to like, enjoy something for a little bit and it's making the rounds in that circuit.

Sarah Skilton: I agree. I think that's true. And what you just described was also very similar to my experience reading Twilight. I don't know, 15, 20, whenever because I was, I had the flu and I was stuck at home and it had, again, come in at the library and I couldn't separate the experience of reading it from my illness, it felt very heightened and feverish [00:12:00] and like, like a fever dream, honestly.

And that was a very similar experience I had when reading this book. You sink into it, and eventually you have to stop asking yourself, questions about the world building or the logic of what's happening and just give yourself over to it completely. And I think people really enjoy that feeling of just being in a runaway cart and you're not going to really think too much about it.

That's part of the appeal. Just let it wash over you. Don't ask questions.

Andrea Martucci: It's all vibes.

Sarah Skilton: Mm hmm.

Andrea Martucci: I saw that you were reading this, and we started talking about it, I was like, okay, I'm about to go on vacation, so I'll read this and then we'll talk about it. And I was on vacation in Montreal and we went to a bookstore and I literally bought this on vacation and so I'm sitting down in my hotel room or like I was out at the pool.

Sarah Skilton: Was the clerk familiar with it? or

Andrea Martucci: They didn't say anything.

Sarah Skilton: I'm always curious when they're into what's going on or if they're familiar with what's popular and if they have an opinion.

Andrea Martucci: It was like one of these really big chain books, I think it was like Indigo which is a big chain bookstore and the person was like way more interested in selling us on some sort of like loyalty membership and I was like I'm not from here like I'm

Sarah Skilton: Let me have my book.

Andrea Martucci: yeah exactly so anyways I'm sitting down like next to the pool and I open this up and there's this like big map on the inside and I was like okay let me like get the lay the land and I start trying to out which

Sarah Skilton: Did you realize how irrelevant it was pretty quickly? The map, I don't even think I, I don't understand the War College's layout.

Andrea Martucci: I got I don't know, a few pages in and they start mentioning the different areas and I referenced the map and I was like, oh, where are these places on the map? None of them are on the map.

Sarah Skilton: Uh, Yeah,

Andrea Martucci: I was like, what? Okay. And that was maybe the second point at which I was like, okay.

The first point, which you also pointed out is that. before you even get to chapter one, there's this little note, there's a little dragon, and it says,

Sarah Skilton: God.

Andrea Martucci: "The following text has been faithfully transcribed from Navarrian into the modern language by Jacinia Nilewart, Curator of the Scribe Quadrant at Basquiath War College.

All events are true, and names have been preserved to honor the courage of those fallen. May their souls be commended to Malik." And I'm like,

Sarah Skilton: I wasn't mad about it when I first read it. And then later on, every time I remembered that was there, I would just feel this like rage inside me because okay, so many questions. Who was translating it? It is in first person present tense as it happens. And she's talking constantly about her lust for Xaden.

Like, how was this transmitted? Why was it translated? Why wouldn't they, much like the back matter editor of the large print version, cut out the stuff that maybe wasn't relevant to the history of the current war or the current [00:15:00] conflict? It was a bonkers thing to put in. It made no sense to me.

And I also just thought it was lazy. It was basically saying a better version of this story exists in Navarrean language with richer metaphors and descriptions and maps and life and times of Navarre, but you're living in the year of 2023, modern, stupid person. So this is what you get to read with all the slang and modern language and none of the world building and none of the like fantasy elements that people usually look to fantasy to provide.

I was just the audacity. Yeah,

Andrea Martucci: The audacity. Yeah, I think in particular, it's like I read that and then I like look at chapter one, which is on the facing page. And again, it's the, "I tighten the straps of my heavy canvas rucksack" and I'm like, first person present. Like it's not a diary entry. It's not a memory that somebody is writing down later.

Sarah Skilton: no, it's none of those things.

Andrea Martucci: It doesn't make any sense. And okay, so we later meet Jesinia,

Sarah Skilton: We do I didn't even remember that. Okay.

She is the scribe who is her friend

Oh.

Andrea Martucci: in the scribe college, Look, this is just one of these things that is like a problem with the writing of this book. The first time she even goes into the archives and she's talking to Jesinia, there's reference to them signing to each other to speak.

And at first, I was like, oh, maybe because you have to be quiet in the archives, maybe all of the scribes sign to each other instead of speaking out loud so that it can remain quiet.

Sarah Skilton: Okay

Andrea Martucci: this is my literal first impression of this place

Sarah Skilton: your brain was trying to make sense and giving more to the thought that was put into this book than what is actually there. I like when a kid's program with my son, like my brain's Oh, I wonder what their backstory is. And it's like, no, that's not what this is.

My brain is scrabbling to make sense more than what is there kind of thing. And that's a really good interpretation that would have been cool. And it would have made sense for library to have that going on.

I totally forgot we even met her.

Andrea Martucci: We can infer that she is deaf and signs and, randomly, a good amount of people know how to sign, but because there's no world building, we really have no sense of, like, how Navarre treats people with disabilities and how widespread the use of sign language is

Sarah Skilton: Oh no, not at all. It's just plopped in there.

Andrea Martucci: good people know how to sign.

We do know that.

Sarah Skilton: Yes, smart scribes know how to sign, but also in that [00:18:00] disclaimer at the front, it was like, it has been translated into the modern language. But do they speak American English, like modern language instilled with their language, but it's modern.

Like it, I have so many like, I'm stuttering.

Like I can't even get my thoughts out with how bizarre this all was.

Andrea Martucci: And it, okay. So I feel like at some point --we're getting so caught up in this, but it's, but I think this is representative of the issues of this text. Is "faithfully transcribed from Navarrian into the modern language." Now something that gets discussed eventually much later in this book and maybe in the next book is that like when all these different countries unified they decided on a common language,

Sarah Skilton: Okay.

Andrea Martucci: which might be Navarian, but I thought they called it like the common language or something like that. So like my mind's skipped over this too, but if modern language is meant to be like the common language spoken across the continent, I thought that was Navarian.

So why is it being translated? And it's not being translated into 2023 because Jesinia exists in this book.

Sarah Skilton: Right. I know. So who translated Jesinia? It's turtles all the way It's other people translating it until we were gifted Fourth Wing at Barnes and Noble or Indigo. And now we have this precious material in our hands with phrases like, "he is freaking beautiful." And, " you're not a morning person" to the dragon. Just all the 2023 things. So we can grasp it.

It's yeah, she didn't want to dig into the world building because that probably didn't interest her. She wants a fantasy book so that there can be dragons and that there can be, like, war.

But she doesn't really want to figure out the worldbuilding or the language that might be in this world, or even when it takes place. Like, I have no idea. It's like with Star Wars. They they have technology, but they don't have all the technology. They have inkblots, except until they can manifest pens. Do you remember how they manifested pens?

Andrea Martucci: They have modern indoor plumbing they say at some point, But no, it's like, just don't even think about it. Like it's, basically like the bare minimum of explanation so that we're not like thinking about them pooping in the woods or smelly or something. But beyond that it's yeah.

Okay. So anyways, did you enjoy this book? What,

what's the what Are the good parts about this book? Once we get past the first page.

Sarah Skilton: Yes. Okay. So the first page, I didn't think much of it at the time. And then later I was like, wait a minute, but okay. Yes, I did enjoy the book to an extent. We'll put that there as my little caveat because there is a ton to love about it and it does read so easily. And it's like the flip side of all of my compliments is that a lot of the things that I did think worked [00:21:00] are also some of the things that I wish it had done better in a way.

So, I absolutely love the dragons. I don't know too much about Rebecca. I haven't read her other books, for example, but I think she writes contemporary romance, or she had up until this point. And so she wanted to stretch her wings, haha, to stretch her dragon wings and move into a fantasy space.

And the dragons are amazing. Dragons are so much fun and I do that's when the book became her own was once the dragons showed up. Now it took a couple hundred pages and up until then it was like fairly derivative of not even like Harry Potter but like the magicians specifically or anytime where they go to school and they're learning how to manifest powers it was very derivative of that but with extra deadliness so I really did love the dragons I love their telepathy you I loved X Men comics as a kid, and Shadowcat or Kitty Pryde had a dragon.

I've always wanted to have a dragon. The little golden one in the book is absolutely precious. It's called a Feathertail, which I thought was brilliant and adorable. We're doing spoilers, right?

Andrea Martucci: Oh yeah.

Sarah Skilton: Okay, she bonds with two dragons. One of them's the big bad dragon, and one of them's the cute little baby dragon. And I loved both of them.

They both brought different things to the table. I loved their telepathy, how they channeled powers. I loved that Violet herself was not physically strong. This is not a Katniss with her archery. This is not somebody who even seems like she would ever possibly be able to survive this setting.

So I was rooting for her from the start. I liked that even though she wasn't physically strong, and in fact seemed to have some unnamed physical ailment that made her more vulnerable to issues with her joints, I think it

Andrea Martucci: Okay, so the way it's described sounds I think it's called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, where,

Sarah Skilton: I'm not familiar

Andrea Martucci: with that

which is, this is like a real thing, and it's your joints are way too flexible, which then causes injuries,

Sarah Skilton: subluxion was used, the word subluxation, or something like that.

Andrea Martucci: yeah so it's the kind of thing where she's very prone to injuries, she's constantly like wrapping her joints so that they don't come out of their joint. But a lot of like the perceived weakness is like, she's small and then they hear that she has a joint disorder or something like.

Sarah Skilton: There's no name given to it, and she's always been this way. So I liked that aspect of her character, because that meant she had to use her wits and her compassion, and also she had a little bit of cheat sheets. Her older brother and older sister had left behind this journal. Even though you're supposed to burn everything after somebody dies.

But, anyway, they somehow managed to smuggle this journal to Violet. Her older sister Mira, her older brother, I can't remember his name. So she's got this edge that she can rely on in order to like, poison her [00:24:00] enemies. And I liked that she had to come up with a way around all the physical stuff that everyone else was focusing on.

That was really satisfying and enjoyable.

I loved that from the moment we meet her, even though she's been thrust into this terrifying situation by her mother of all people, that hasn't made her cynical, and it hasn't made her cutthroat toward other people. She has her empathy intact. She helps out someone who becomes her good friend by giving her one of her shoes that will stick to the parapet better.

So even though she might be risking her own life by doing this, she cares enough about other people that she's willing to do that. And I thought that was great.

I love that the entire reason that she bonds with the Feathertail was because she was trying to protect the baby dragon from some other cadets who were intending to kill it. They felt it was a weak dragon, they didn't want it to be part of their war effort. And she risks her life to protect this dragon. I thought that was a great, justifiable, satisfying way for her to end up getting two dragons bonded to her.

think some people got annoyed like, oh, she's so unlike other girls that she gets two dragons. I didn't mind that at all. That was catnip me. I was like, yeah, she should get two dragons. She's the best.

I loved Xaden for the most part, because he had all that stuff that I really do like in a romantasy hero, which came out in the Draco and Hermione fanfic that you got obsessed with on this podcast

Andrea Martucci: Manacled? Mm

Sarah Skilton: Yes, I'd forgotten the name, but I could picture it so clearly. Where he is totally tortured, he's got the back tattoos to prove it, he's been whipped, dad led the rebellion, his dad is dead, but even though he was forced to come to War College and didn't have that choice that everyone else had, it wasn't a volunteer position for him, he's making the best of it and he's looking out for all the other rebels.

I felt like a good frat, because I always think of frats as evil, but this was like frat, and he caring and considerate and protective. All good things in a love interest, in my opinion. I loved that, When she is attacked in her sleep. This was a rule that was followed, kind of not, because why wouldn't you just pretend to be asleep?

Andrea Martucci: None of the rules....

Sarah Skilton: I don't know what I'm saying. I know that none rules mattered. I keep scrabbling for purchase with these rules but allegedly, it was not cool if people killed you in your sleep. Any other time was fine, but not cool if you were sleeping. So when she is attacked in her sleep, Xaden frickin murders everyone who attacked her.

There's no trial. There's no bringing it to whoever the nameless, endless teachers are that have no distinguishing characteristics. No authority is brought in. Xaden just executes them all. And I loved it. I loved that he came in and protected her. I thought that was great.

And I liked that he and the dragon appreciated Violet for what the others consider the detriments to her character. They assumed competence instead of denigrating her or assuming weakness.

Of course, she's at a love triangle so the other part [00:27:00] of the love triangle is always trying to protect her, but not in the same way that Xaden's trying to protect her. Xaden's trying to protect her because that will simultaneously protect him, but also because he thinks that she is stronger and better and wittier and smarter than everyone, and that he knows she'll be deadly if she's given the, parameters that she needs, which kind of reminds me of a biker gang romance. And all his rebels will protect her because she's now under their I don't know, their protection kind of thing. Which I also have a weakness for.

The character growth was not huge, but I did like how if you looked back at the first chapter and you looked at the last chapter, her outlook has been expanded. She's broadened her horizons. She's now risking her life, not just to try to survive this college, but to prove to Xaden that their relationship is worth the risk. I liked that.

And I couldn't stop. For the first couple chapters, I had a lot of trouble, and I considered DNFing it because of the quality of the writing.

So there was a touch and go where I was like, I don't even know if I do this. I was curious enough but now I know enough where I'm like, eh, I But once I got to the dragons, then I was pretty much full steam ahead until the last couple of chapters, when I just got bored.

Andrea Martucci: It does go on.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah, it wouldn't end, and there was a lot going on at the end that was supposed to be super exciting and twisty and Oh this happens. And then this happens. And then can you believe it? That this was what was going on all along. And I was like, yeah, I figured that out on like page five.

And so now that seeing it happen, I didn't care as much.

I was pretty addicted to it. I definitely once I got to the dragons, it was like, Oh, I can't put this down. I'm thinking about it. I can't wait to get back to it. Anything that is interrupting me I'm angry at, I just want to read this book.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. So very similar where I was like, what? Like very disoriented at first and then you give yourself over to the experience

Sarah Skilton: You stop resisting. You just go, I'm not going to think about it. I'm not going to waste the energy being annoyed. I'm

Andrea Martucci: Mm hmm.

Sarah Skilton: just going to let it happen.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah and I think the reason it works is because she skips over every single thing that's boring. If there's like a month of them training, She jumps right into a scene and she's like, "over the last month of training, we've done X, Y, Z," and you're like, okay, cool. you know,

Sarah Skilton: very well

Andrea Martucci: on to the next event. Cool. I guess nothing noteworthy happened. That's fine. This book is very derivative in ways. I think that when I think of like the Harry Potter ish influences there's like the houses. And so instead of the houses, you have the riders versus the infantry versus the scribes versus the healers.

And where there's a lot of, it's not just your job, it's your entire personality. And there's the rule followers, which is the infantry. And they're okay, but they're dumb. And like, you know, we don't think they're very cool.

Sarah Skilton: They couldn't cut it with the dragons. The dragons would have just murdered them instantly with their [00:30:00] flames.

Andrea Martucci: And it's like, okay, like obviously the riders are Gryffindor, right?

There's definitely

Sarah Skilton: they don't even interact with quadrants. There's no interaction with them. So you're suffocatingly only with the riders and their like cutthroat, thin the herd worldview. I couldn't picture, A GD thing.

Andrea Martucci: Anything. Yeah.

Sarah Skilton: not the mess hall, not the grounds, not the dorms, not even the field where the dragons are, barely the garden.

It's all a blank. like, you're in this white room, you just, okay, I'm gonna go with it she might die, don't think about it, doesn't matter where she is or what's happening. Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, and that's the thing is it's it's scene after scene that like, it propels you forward with this idea of now we've got this trial and now we've got the gauntlet. And again I couldn't picture the gauntlet. We're told like, oh there's the first thing that is challenging because of this.

And the second thing, and I'm like, I don't know what you're doing. And I think part of it is because the challenges happen so fast and furious that you never are introduced or given time to other than the gauntlet is coming, the gauntlet is coming. You're never really told what the gauntlet is, or again, it's never described very well,

Sarah Skilton: Right, you just know that this is happening, and she might die. And there were like 17 things, from the parapet, to sparring, to they had all these names, the threshing, the channeling, The, I don't know, the presentation. Every time came in front of a dragon or whatever, they had all these different and you knew it was coming up.

You didn't know what it meant or what it would be like, but then you're doing it, and then it's over. But you can't relax, and there's no downtime, because the next thing is now nipping heels, and it's equally deadly. And at first, that is just pretty riveting, and you're like, your heart's pounding, and you want to find out.

And then after a while, it has a flattening effect, and feel bludgeoned by it. At least I did. Because if everything's deadly, is anything? And anyone who died was nobody that we even knew. It was literally people we'd never heard of. Until the end.

Andrea Martucci: Halfway through the book, we meet somebody where it's it honestly felt like a sacrificial lamb know, where I'm like, like, okay, we're getting to know this person.

Sarah Skilton: Yep

Andrea Martucci: Hrm, what's going to happen here? And speaking of characterization other than the relationship between Violet, and Xaden, spelled with an X.

Sarah Skilton: Yes, of course.

Andrea Martucci: At least their relationship is pretty clear. And we get enough descriptions of Xaden and we get the same descriptions over and over again of Violet, whatever, at least I can picture them in my mind.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: And I think there's maybe like the relationship with Dane and Rhiannon that at least I can remember who they are.

Sarah Skilton: They were core four, and everyone else was canon fodder

yeah,

Andrea Martucci: yeah, and every single person, weirdly, [00:33:00] is described by the way they look, and it's always a scene like, " I look over at Ridoc, with the, with hair the color of wheat after threshing" and then like really cringingly, skin color is only ever described when it's a color other than a white skin color.

Sarah Skilton: She's very pale. They that clear at the beginning because the mom is like, you're so

Andrea Martucci: hmm,

Sarah Skilton: Child with silver hair. You should cut it. And oh, yeah, like the hair. So we're told very early on that almost every woman in the rider quadrant chops off their hair because it gets in the way. assume It could catch fire. There's so many, it could strangle you. I don't know. But then every woman we meet has long hair and a braid. I'm like, why did you even bother to establish that every woman cuts their hair short? Which they logically probably would do. Only to have every woman who actually matters in the story has long braided hair.

Andrea Martucci: Or oh, she had like badass pink hair shaved on the sides

Sarah Skilton: all you know about them? And then the next day they're dead and you're like, oh, pink haired person, oh like,

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, I think some of the descriptions, they were so hamfisted, there's a part of me where I'm like, okay, good for you, building a war college that is just very gender neutral, uh,

Sarah Skilton: that was nice.

Andrea Martucci: There's no gender inequality that we tell in this world.

Sarah Skilton: That's right. that's true.

Andrea Martucci: which is okay, cool. There doesn't seem to be any like racial issues. you know, The war college seems to be comprised of people, of many racial backgrounds, and it's just not an issue. Okay. Cool. Like a teeny weeny bit of world building, then the descriptions around it always felt incredibly cringy and unnatural like I mean the same thing where I'm like Oh cool. There are deaf people in this world like awesome. There are accommodations for people with disabilities, unless you have weak joints

Sarah Skilton: right?

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. Okay, cool. And there's somebody with they, them pronouns and like whatever. But yeah, just it always felt so hamfisted.

Sarah Skilton: And it would be once, so except for Violet and Xaden, it would be once. And so the next time you see them, they're either irrelevant or they're dead and you've not made any attachments to them. And so if you're killing off all these people that don't matter, it starts to just not matter to the reader. I felt.

Because obviously Xaden and Violet are not going to die. There's like going to five of these. So it's you're really that worried. You're worried she might be injured. But again, even though she has this problem with her joints and she's allegedly constantly in pain, we don't know what that feels like.

So it'll actually say, it said this at least twice, "the pain was indescribable." And then it moves on to the next thing. And I'm like, you could try to it given that this a book and that's like your form of communication with us, [00:36:00] is describing things like or "I've had this bandage on for three weeks and I'm finally starting to heal."

I'm like, okay it didn't seem to affect you in any way like you're not limping you're not taking pain medicine you're not holding off on the training, in fact you're going harder than ever and you're falling off the dragon and you're doing all these crazy things so what's the point of having somebody who's supposedly in constant pain if it doesn't make a difference to her actions or how she gets through the day.

Andrea Martucci: Well and I think this is like part of maybe some of the feeling of stagnation of this book where everything is always happening, but it doesn't always feel like things are actually changing. I feel like at the beginning of the book there's a little bit of acknowledgement that she's huffing and puffing, carrying like a heavy pack up the stairs.

And by maybe I don't know, a quarter of the way into the book, she's like, wow, I can carry a much heavier pack. And it hardly any strain. You're like, okay, we're seeing just a little bit of change and growth.

Then throughout the book, it's like, oh, she's being trained and now she's a better fighter, but everything feels very black and white.

She's either terrible at fighting or she gets trained and now she's great at fighting. But it never feels like, incremental movements.

Sarah Skilton: like a flipbook where she skipped some of the pictures in the middle. You flipped from the beginning to now she's doing the thing. But you don't see or feel or experience the growth for yourself. You're just told it has taken place and you just accept it and move on because the next deadly scene is coming up.

Andrea Martucci: I understand there's like a certain amount of tension where we know that at some point before the gauntlet she has figured out a solution using her brain to solve the gauntlet and I understand why before that scene the author doesn't want her to think of the idea and the reader to know. We want to see it happen but that process of her thinking like we don't even get a little bit more at least like a teaser of what she's thinking or It's not done very well.

And then you get to the gauntlet and then she describes what she's doing. And I'm like, I still don't understand she is doing. I sort of understand there's like something with ropes she's leveraging the ropes somehow. Again, it just, it didn't make any sense.

And then I think the other part of the black and whiteness of it was like, that she kept having the same conflict over and over again.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah

Andrea Martucci: "Oh, I can't do it. I'm physically weaker than everybody." And then Xaden would be like, "you're really smart. Use your goddamn brain."

And she'd be like, hrm okay. And then like you know, would like figure it out. And it just felt like that kept happening.

Or she's like, Oh, I'm still struggling with this. And I'm like, did you practice? did you? Did you literally do anything there? I actually, I'll be honest, I did buy the second book and start reading it and everybody told me the second book was bad and they're right. [00:39:00] Anyways

Sarah Skilton: Well, you went further than I did.

Andrea Martucci: This happens in the first book too. She's like struggling with a skill her, what do we call it?

Your signet. Yeah. So like her signet and like the spoilers, her signet is like

Sarah Skilton: Stopping time. She can stop time.

Andrea Martucci: temporary one.

While her baby dragon is a baby, she can stop time, but then her big bad boy dragon allows her to like channel lightning or something.

And she first has the ability and she struggles so hard with it, but doesn't ever seem to practice and doesn't ever seem to do anything to refine her ability to get better in any way, like with aiming or improving upon the initial thing that started happening.

Sarah Skilton: You know, it's so interesting that you say that. I didn't even think about that. But I agree, and in The Magicians by Lev Grossman, I was always struck by how the opposite it was, where you're constantly seeing them working on their homework, for lack better word, and like really struggling to make things match up and to happen and to work properly, and that for people who had a nerdy time in high school or who struggled with work or who can imagine practicing magic as a skill like any other that you have to hone.

That was very interesting to see that reflected. But yeah, in this book, there's none of that.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, again, it's like, we're told Violet is so smart and like can study and knows all these things, and yet it never occurs to her to practice or read more about these things until Xaden recommends it. I'm just like, oh, okay.

Sarah Skilton: he knew just what she needed to hear to unleash it in that moment. He needed to believe in her unlike Dane.

Andrea Martucci: So let's talk about the love triangle, because this is romance novel podcast.

So I found the love triangle really uninteresting because there's no tension. We know as soon as Xaden steps onto the scene that Dane, her childhood best friend who she has a little bit of a crush on because he's cute, we know it's going nowhere. She's like, oh, huh, he changed. He's a bit of a rule follower. He's still cute.

Then Xaden shows up and she's like, (pants heavily)

Sarah Skilton: Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: like, like, we know. Okay. And and then things happen pretty quickly. Dane is not an option after 10 percent or 15 percent into this book. I was really expecting that to get drawn out for a little bit longer.

And maybe again, people were calling this dragon porn and saying that there's so much sex. I was expecting her to like, have sex with Dane.

Sarah Skilton: I was too. They had one kiss. It did nothing for her. Then she was like, oh, and then she basically tells him, yeah, that didn't really work for me, And he's like, oh, okay. And that's about the end of that. Yeah. It fizzled out.

And then of course you had to have like her friend Rhiannon being [00:42:00] like. "You're cranky because you're not getting any." And then it like, that whole best friend trope of she notices instantly if her friend is not getting laid and then thinks that she ought to and blah, blah, blah. But then they also get horny because the dragons are horny because they're like telepathically bonded with them.

I honestly thought the sex was going to be, really good and that they do it on top of a dragon or something like that and when we finally get to the sex scene I was so let down was completely blah blah blah it did nothing for me.

And there been really good build up. I thought the build up really good with her and Xaden like their stolen kisses, and the way that, the tension would fill the air, and she could sense his presence behind her every time he entered the room, and it was crackling.

And then when they finally had sex, I was like, not only did that not turn me on, but it sounded painful in not a fun way at all. Yeah, I was very disappointed with the sex scene, and the love triangle, it served its purpose in that it clarified for her what a good partner should be. Dane was not that, and Xaden proved himself eventually to be that. But yeah, there was no tension, really, as to who she was going to choose.

Andrea Martucci: I think the flatness of the foils in this book are like, okay, we get it Dane not believing in her is in contrast to Xaden always believing in her, right? That contrast is there to call attention to what a good partner or potential partner Xaden is, and even though he's her mortal enemy, like, why he's better.

Okay, cool, I get it, I understand why that contrast is there. But it was always so blatant and un nuanced that it just always felt so frustrating.

And I think that this is where I feel like as hardcore romance reader. I just feel a little bit like mystified sometimes when people read this book, I get that like a lot of it is really about her lusting after this guy, but there's two sex scenes and then they really try to build up this idea of everyone being horny and like this person's sleeping with this person and these two are coming out of their room and it's like very queer friendly just like nobody bats an eye at same sex partners whatever but it's not sexy it doesn't actually feel sexy

Sarah Skilton: it didn't.

Andrea Martucci: at all

Sarah Skilton: at all. And I have to assume, so I saw on Reddit, somebody said that this was a fantasy book for people who hate fantasy. And I feel like it was like a sexy book for people who've never read a sexy book. that's what they think would be a naughty, sexy, crazy, dragon, porny type of book.

And I'm like, Oh, it didn't do much for me in that regard.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. And also, oh, honey, this is a 500 page book. Two sex scenes in a 500 book does not dragon porn make.

Sarah Skilton: No.

Andrea Martucci: also, if you say dragon porn, that has very different connotations to I'm going to think the dragons be doing it.

Sarah Skilton: I was waiting for that to happen as [00:45:00] well. I waiting for so much crazy shit to happen that just did not come pass

Andrea Martucci: Okay, and so the horny dragons influencing humans isn't that a thing in Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey?

Hold on. okay, Dragonflight, which is the Dragonriders of Pern, where, isn't it like when the dragons mate the Dragonriders also?

Sarah Skilton: I haven't read those.

Andrea Martucci: Okay, I started reading it. If you know this, there is definitely a existing fantasy series where the actions of the dragons also influence the humans who ride them.

So okay, this has been done before. It's fine. We know that this is derivative.

Is this to you, it's romantasy. If you had to say, is it more romance or is it more fantasy? And how does it stack up as either if you just look at the romance in the context of romance and the fantasy in the context of fantasy, What are your thoughts on that?

Sarah Skilton: Okay, for me personally, it occupied this liminal space. It's not fantasy in the way that I think of fantasy, which does tend to have the world building, the language, the maps that make sense, the relevant details about the history of the world, things like that, where you're immersing yourself in an entirely different universe.

It doesn't have that aspect, because it's too modern, and there's no explanation for so many of the things.

But I've read was YA romantasy that was more romantic than this, even if didn't have sex.

So a duology that I absolutely loved by Mary E. Pearson called Dance of Thieves. It's two books.

I just couldn't get enough of it. It had all the things that we've been mentioning that this one doesn't necessarily do, and I found it to be immensely romantic. And I think that occupied the space even more.

Now, if this is considered more of a like new adult romantasy, I think it works more in that category than in just fantasy.

A book that I read recently by Leslie O'Sullivan, I would also definitely qualify as romantasy. A Kingdom of Souls and Shadows. There's a lot more scenes of just the two main characters together where their relationship is building in a linear way, but also with the sexiness that that sort of denotes.

So I feel like this definitely is a strange amalgamation of a couple of different genres that doesn't settle firmly into one or the other, like it's definitely No Poppy War by R. F. Kuang which is insanely violent and vicious, but you feel it as opposed to just reading about how violent it is.

So I really feel like of all the romantasy or fantasy that I've read, this just doesn't fall neatly into any of those slots for me personally. It's commercial enough that people who don't read [00:48:00] either of those categories can pick it up and not feel like they're adrift and feel like they have to be, quote unquote, a romantic reader or a fantasy reader to enjoy it, and that's partially why it's so popular.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah.

Sarah Skilton: It's for people who don't read, honestly who they read couple of books a year and this is one of the ones they picked up and they think it's really innovative and exciting and cool and sexy. But if you're accustomed to reading in either of those categories, this won't necessarily hit all those marks for you.

Andrea Martucci: I know that I've gone way too deep into being a romance reader, to the point where my conversations about romance- I'm sorry, this might be news for some of these listeners, but probably not. The conversation I'm gonna have about romance is like, so many layers deep, like you have to know I'm sorry, I'm not talking myself up here, I'm actually talking about like a problem that I feel like I have, which is that I can't have a normal conversation about romance because I'm just like so deep into the minutiae of it which I think sometimes can make the conversations I want to have like inaccessible.

So... sorry.

But I agree with that totally where it assumes that there's no genre competence in the reader. And so if you are coming in with genre competence either in romance or fantasy, I think the whole idea of, I'm going to just keep saying this, genre competence, is that you have some level of expectation for that genre and you know what about it you enjoy. And that's tied together.

The expectation is you understand what it is about this thing that you enjoy and like you were talking about with fantasy, the reason most people like fantasy is because they like the world building. They like to escape to this other world and have it be different enough and then they get into how is it different? And why is it different? And blah, blah, blah.

And with romance, I think there's a lot of things like why people like it, but there definitely is that sort of wish fulfillment fantasy of being validated and being the center of the world and a sense of justice.

Like a just world where you win and the people who hurt you lose and they feel bad and they get punished and like you get the job promotion, you get the two dragons like, you know, like it all works out. And there's some other person who just worships the ground you walk on and sees the things about you that nobody else sees or not a lot of other people see.

Yeah it feels much more successfully a romance novel in that sense, because I think it knows the romance beats. But as somebody who's very much a very deep romance reader can just call up like 75 other examples of books that did everything that it does okay better.

Sarah Skilton: Yes. Yes. I know what you mean. And when I was thinking to myself I know what I think this is a little bit derivative of, but let me see what other people think. And on Goodreads, people would say it was [00:51:00] derivative of books I'd never even heard of. I feel either as though the author read a lot of fantasy in preparation and I picked and chose from things that she personally really liked, which I think is some of the delicious, buttery goodness of parts of the book.

She picked the parts that spoke to her and then she cranked them up a little and her version of dragons and dragon lore. Or she didn't read enough, she thinks she's doing something that's novel or that's different from everything else that is out there and for me just didn't simply ring true. Like was going to do the fantasy she could have taken her time a bit more but it feels like somebody who has written a ton of romance books and like you said understands all those beats and is just now overlaying them on the most basic frame of fantasy so that it can be called romantasy.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. And then I think if it is successfully doing the romance part of it, the downfall is that I'm on book two of, what is it going to be, three, four, five books? We don't know, right? And they're all giant tomes. And the problem with that as a romance, in my opinion, in my learned opinion,

Sarah Skilton: Yes.

Andrea Martucci: Is, how do you keep the romantic tension going?

They know that they're endgame. They literally say it to each other. You're endgame. I love you. They have the sizzling hots for each other. There's really no real external conflict keeping them apart. Other than temporarily, physically not being able to be in the same place at some points.

Sarah Skilton: But dragons will also fly to each other every three days. So also felt like a false dilemma to me a little bit.

Andrea Martucci: yeah.

Sarah Skilton: will we do when he's far away and I'm here? The dragons won't allow that. They'll swoop you up, pick you up, and take you to him.

Andrea Martucci: And also literally their dragons are mated. Literally, these two people they physically can't be apart. And if one of them dies, probably both of them will die because of whatever world building this book

Sarah Skilton: decided to do

Wait, also, I wasn't sure if that was even true. Because once in a while they'd be like, he'll die if we don't protect you. And it was like, oh, okay, cool. This is intense. And then later they'd say, he'd probably die. And

Andrea Martucci: Probably die.

Sarah Skilton: was like, okay, wait, so which is it and why? I don't know that he would die for sure.

But ththey're nervous that he might. The Probably was doing a lot of lifting, when you don't actually get any answers about whether that's accurate or not, or just a vague, amorphous fear that they have.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah what is the romantic tension, and I will tell you, it is just eye roll y in book two, where she's like, "I don't know if I can trust you, because-" I'm like, shut the fuck up, Violet. like, come on. You are on death's door. Constantly. Like, why are you like, oh, I can't trust you? I'm like, you are, almost dying all the time. Why are you not capable of just enjoying this person?

There were parts of it that were just nonsensical and frustrating, but then it [00:54:00] was just like, oh, okay, we have to create some false emotional conflict here because otherwise again, I don't think it actually created tension but then we have this whole second book we have to get through and then like however many future books.

And personally, I don't like romance books where the relationship, is carrying on over multiple books. Again, this is just like my personal thing. I know there are some very successful trilogies out there where the relationship progresses over the course of the books or what is that the In Death series by JD Robb which is not technically a romance but there is a romantic arc even over the course of 20 or 30 or however many books right. They're like in a relationship and they're again, it's just, it's not for me.

Like I want that single book arc of a relationship and then I want them to be happily ever after. And then I want to move on to another couple or relationship. You can like build it in the same world, like cool. We got violent and Xaden. And now we're gonna get Rhiannon and Tara, but probably not because they're on again off again and I don't know what Tara looks like and I thought she died at some point and all of a sudden she was back Yeah,

Sarah Skilton: I I feel like the most you can do is a duology. And like the one I mentioned by Mary E. Pearson is a great duology. I like Leigh Bardugo's Six and Crows is a duology because I feel like that's enough time where it can either be like maybe the internal problem is the first book and then the external problem is the second book and then you still have the tension because you know if only they could find each other, rescue each other from prison or whatever it is that's happened in the second book is an external thing because they've dealt their internal things or vice versa, whatever it it's like you got two plots for the romance to have a happily ever after. The internal is dealt with and the external is dealt with. Or just one if it's a standalone. But yeah, I agree.

I wanted to ask you, because I have not read ACOTAR yet. that is how many books? Six or seven? Something like that?

Andrea Martucci: I don't know, but so I really, we talked about it on the podcast with Penny Reid. I talked about it on the podcast Penny Reid. We, the Shelf

Sarah Skilton: listened! I the unseen.

Andrea Martucci: we,

Sarah Skilton: was the silent partner. Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: yeah and I really enjoyed ACOTAR and immediately started reading the second book and I never finished the second book

Sarah Skilton: Oh, I didn't realize that.

Andrea Martucci: I actually like the relationship. in the second book better but I was kind of like, oh, okay, I know what's happening.

And then I was like, I'm done. I didn't care, really. I was just like, oh, okay. Huh. And I like, skipped ahead. And then I was like, I have no desire to see this through however many books you are gonna take me through because what all of this war stuff. Ain't for me. Sorry.

But I think ACOTAR what I do think is interesting about ACOTAR is it similarly has lazy ish world building as this book or the series. Like, where it's indifferent sometimes about, like, how deep it wants to go into the world building. [00:57:00] But I feel like it's more of a romance than a fantasy. The plot is the romance, right? The romantic relationship. Again, I don't really know, like, how that keeps working later.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah, because it's a lot of books and I haven't read any of them, but I know that that's the one that I feel like really did jumpstart the romantasy craze and I'd see all these titles at the store or on my feeds of a blank of blank and blank and it be just like almost a game like a title generator, because that immediately tells you it's a romantasy is a blank of blank and blank.

Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. And then the cover is like dark and there's like a sword with some roses around it. Yeah, they all look the same. And I, when I was in the bookstore and it was a big bookstore, but there was an aisle that was fantasy, which was primarily romantic fantasy.

It was enormous. And they're all these like thick, hardcover, you know, which I'm sure the publishers love that they can put these in hardcover and charge 30 US dollars for them. I had to pay 35 Canadian dollars for this book, but it's okay. The exchange rate is favorable. Um, think ACOTAR was really a romance first and I get it.

It is romantasy. I'm not arguing about that. It is still a fantasy, but I think this book, Fourth Wing, Despite the fact that I think the romance is more successful, I think you could take out the romantic plot and just have the rest of the plot and it would still be a book.

Sarah Skilton: Okay. Yeah, I know what you mean. You can unbraid it,

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, and I'm sure there's people who would think that's the whole point, you're not supposed to be able to unbraid it. Like, where you're not supposed say can it be a fantasy without the romance, or vice versa. But like, do think it could be a fantasy without the romance. I don't think it could be a romance without the fantasy.

Because it would be literally nothing.

Sarah Skilton: Uh huh. Yeah. I mean I suppose it would just be like a dark academia intellectual rivals? I don't know. I'm not sure exactly what it would be. Or Romeo and Juliet, your family screwed my family and my family needs vengeance. I'm not sure what it would be exactly. But that turns out to not even be true because there's never a moment when he actually did want to kill her.

Andrea Martucci: Because he could instantly see that she was a good person because she gave Rhiannon her boot.

Sarah Skilton: Exactly. So from then he was already obsessed with her, oh which is why if they had done dual POV, it wouldn't have worked at all. And for a lot of romance texts, it's more fulfilling when there is dual POV because the misunderstandings are more poignant. And you have this whole other, person's point of view to contend with, obviously, but this wouldn't have worked at all because the whole terror that she feels that his six foot four frame is that he could kill her muscular and could snap her neck at any moment or whatever.

So yeah, if you had his POV, it would be over, I think.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. And also he's too powerful. I think both of them are too powerful and they're too good at everything and from the beginning everyone's like, they're the most powerful riders s that will ever [01:00:00] exist. You're like, okay.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah. has the biggest dragon until Violet shows up. Now she has the biggest dragon. Have you gotten to the part in book two? I haven't read it myself, but I hear that he actually is also a telepath. Who's managed to escape notice and conveniently get out of the death sentence would normally give someone, someone lesser than Xaden.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, mind readers are put to death immediately without trial,

Sarah Skilton: the yes, professor just comes over and murders him. one flinches. It had to be done. It's outlawed

Andrea Martucci: they're like, oh, yeah, we had to kill that guy.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah, bad.

Andrea Martucci: yeah, no, no, it's, it's very nuanced. He doesn't actually read thoughts. He reads intentions.

Sarah Skilton: reads, oh, he does. Okay, then fine. fine. Whatever. He can live.

Andrea Martucci: he, no, he hid it so that nobody knew.

But,

Sarah Skilton: But you know what else? Okay, he has to hide so many things. He has to hide the fact that he is still plotting a rebellion, that he's like a double agent.

Andrea Martucci: Mm hmm. Mm

Sarah Skilton: To hide the fact that he actually secretly loves Violet. He has to hide the fact that the feather tail can stop time. He has hide his own telepathic skills.

He has to hide that her brother's still alive. He's juggling so many secrets that he would just shatter. There's no way that one muscular six four person's brain could handle all those secrets.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah.

Sarah Skilton: He's extra tortured

Andrea Martucci: mean, I think this is the part where, this is not a book about a relationship between two people. It is pure wish fulfillment and it's all about Violet. Xaden only exists to fulfill every single one of Violet's needs. He's not a person, okay?

He's too good at everything. He's the best fighter, he's the best this, he's noble, he's hot, he's everything. And most people think Violet's awesome anyways, but basically nothing else matters other than her. Even, he's like, I don't even care about this war anymore. I'm just trying to keep you alive.

I think that is like another layer of the flatness. There can't be an interesting conflict here other than really stupid things that make the reader roll their eyes, you know?

Sarah Skilton: I really don't know how she's going to spread this out over five books. I assume it'll mostly just be the rebel rebelling. The rebellion of the rebels. then She automatically immediately was like, Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense. Even though it's her mom and there's this whole conspiracy, she's mad that she can't trust him for about two pages, but then she instantly accepts all these worldview overturnings that have now happened in the span of five minutes.

Andrea Martucci: Okay, so that's what I want, I was like, what did I want to mention? Okay this entire book, 38 chapters, 487 pages, is in Violet's point of view. Chapter 39 is in Xaden's perspective,

Sarah Skilton: That's right. I forgot about that.

Andrea Martucci: and it is the stupidest thing [01:03:00] I have ever read in my life. So first of all, we have to deal with the fact that this is like so uneven. Maybe if she was unconscious and we

Sarah Skilton: Why is it in his point of view? What was the justification? Do you remember?

Andrea Martucci: I think the justification is that just before this, there is a little bit of tension about their their relationship

Sarah Skilton: Oh, his betrayal.

Andrea Martucci: His BETRAYAL!

Sarah Skilton: She thinks it's a betrayal. We, by now, are like, that would be too complex for this.

So we know that it's not. But just to hit it home for our dumb 2023 modern brains, she gives him a chapter to be like, but I didn't betray her. Just so we know for sure. Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: And also that moment of him being like, Oh, thank God. She's all right. And then she's like, "I'm not going to forgive you Xaden." And he's like, "Oh no, like she doesn't love me anymore." And I'm just like why did we do this? We know that Violet is an idiot and is going to react like this because she's like a giant martyr.

Okay. While I was reading this book, my husband was literally reading a book called Martyr. And I was like, that would be a great title for this book.

Sarah Skilton: No, I think violence would be a good title for this book. I love Violence

Andrea Martucci: He calls her violence

Sarah Skilton: a t shirt with like a heart. I heart violence.

Andrea Martucci: And so I was just like, look, that is just like such a bad employment of changing perspectives. For like one chapter and why? We didn't get anything new here. Nothing. We didn't learn anything.

Sarah Skilton: No just to reassure people who could not grasp it otherwise. does he have a POV in the second book? Do you know?

Andrea Martucci: Not as far as I've seen. Maybe the last chapter.

Sarah Skilton: I assumed this was the beginning of now him having a POV since they'd be like apart or whatever, but apparently not. Okay. I, it's really funny cause I thought I was going to be like the grumpy to your sunshine today.

In the course of us talking about it, I feel like you became grumpier and I became like slightly sunnier in the course. I don't know. Like we swapped places or something. Cause I I saw on your Instagram, you were like, I get it now. I instantly ordered the next one and I was like, Ooh, she really liked it.

But I feel like you talked yourself into getting a little angrier as you thought about it more and more. Do you think that's accurate?

Andrea Martucci: Okay, I think I got to the end of the first book, and you were saying earlier about how you read Twilight when you were, like, feverish,

Sarah Skilton: bedridden. Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: and it like imbued the experience of reading the book.

Sarah Skilton: was a hallucinatory experience.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah, so I finished book one on vacation, and it was like one of those just like nice lazy morning, like I had been reading it throughout the vacation, but we're in a hotel room together, right?

Me and my husband in one bed and my nine year old in the other bed in one hotel room, and we let her stay up late so that we could stay up late, like till 10. PM. And then I'm like trying to read with a little light and she's yelling at me and I'm literally , I've got like my phone light on, and I'm holding it in my chin so that I can read this book.

Cause I've got a hardcover book that I'm trying to read and getting yelled. So I think there was like a certain sort of like I'm on vacation and I'm enjoying the propelling nature of [01:06:00] this book and all of that. And so I finished it and it, and I was like, ah, like that was a ride. And then I was like, high hopes for the second book.

And then I've been struggling through the second book this week.

And so I think that I've come into this conversation with the second book in my mind more, like where I remember how much I enjoyed the first book, even while being aware of its flaws. But then the second book, I'm just like, wow, this just magnifies everything that annoyed me about the first book and I'm not even enjoying myself.

Sarah Skilton: Oh, that's a bummer. Do you think you'll finish it or do you think you'll ACOTAR it?

Andrea Martucci: I'm pretty close to the end, so I think I'll finish it, but I have like zero interest in reading the next one, and I don't know. I'm curious about the kind of people who get into a series like this and then they're just like, I'm just gonna keep going, I love this.

And what's interesting to me.

And by the way, I sound like such a snot. I know Morgan and Isabeau at Whoa!Mance, who are diehard romance readers, enjoyed the ACOTAR series, right? So, like, don't want to turn this into like, a, genre competence thing only people who don't read other things enjoy these books just as one data point I know that other people enjoy this, but like, I personally, I don't know, it feels like it really fizzled out to me.

I'm not even curious at this point what happens because I'm so bored.

Sarah Skilton: Yeah, at the end of book one, that was exactly how I felt. I had to skim it toward the end, I just didn't care. I was over it, and I was glad I read it because I did want to know, and I feel like I do have a pretty good grasp of what has been so compelling to people. And I think, oh, wait, can I say it?

Did we crack this dragon egg wide open?

Andrea Martucci: Yes, we cracked this dragon egg wide open. So open. Thank you for the recommendations for other books that you enjoyed that do certain things better than what this book does.

I would also be very curious -- look we see this phenomenon a lot right. Like Bridgerton comes out and then everyone's like the hot new historical romance to read after you read Bridgerton or like after 50 Shades of Gray came out like the hot new erotica series that like whatever.

I want to know for people who have dived into the romantasy genre what are the books that are romantasy that we should be reading, right?

Sarah Skilton: I do too. I really want a list.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. I know that basically romantasy has been written for a long time. I'm legitimately curious about the things that are coming out now. What that has come out recently is like, oh, wow, yeah, no, this actually, this does this very well.

Sarah Skilton: I would really like to see what else is out there that maybe will compel me further or will just not be written in such a juvenile style.

She's 20, and [01:09:00] at one says, "I'm acting like a teenager." I'm like, you're 20, hun.

It's not that ago. It's not that you're acting like a teenager, but it read middle grade to me. A lot of the the uncomplex, unnuanced thought process. The dialogue of people shouting backstory at each other and stuff they would never say out loud because they both know it.

It felt so young to me, and I would love to read a romantasy that's for, like, adults more, that it's just bit more going on with it. Because people do it, obviously. I just need to more lists of people that have done it so that I can expand my horizons, too, because it was absolutely delicious for good chunks of it, and I really couldn't stop, and I felt like I never wanted it to end.

And then it was mentioned that it was deadly just one too many times. And there was just one too many moments where I was like, I no longer care. Forget it. I denounce my addiction. Yes. The moment passed. Exactly. It had a big rising and falling action where I didn't know if I could handle it.

Then I absolutely loved it. Then I was skimming. And that was my own arc with this book.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. Well, and I'm curious, but I'm sorry. I don't have the strength or the fortitude to go and comb through. And I don't have the budget. I'm sorry. I don't have 30 dollars to spend on every hardcover, I mean, I could go to the library, whatever. Literally, I just, please, whoever is listening to this, one of you has done a deep dive in romantasy.

Please just tell us the good books.

They're all good books. Tell us the ones no--, tell me the ones that I'm going to enjoy as a romance reader. And I like fantasy. I do like fantasy, but I don't like fantasy without the romance.

Sarah Skilton: I know, exactly. I want some. The Poppy War is just brutal and devastating and beautiful, and I wanted a tiny more of the little bit, the relationships, because the friendships and the crushes are there, but we don't get full blown romance, and I miss that. So I definitely want the combination. It just It just has to be done right. Yeah.

Andrea Martucci: Yeah. I think we cracked this dragon egg wide open. Thank you for that. Sarah, where can people find you on the interwebs if they would like to check out your books or learn more about you?

Sarah Skilton: Yes I am very boringly at sarahskilton. com. That's Sarah with an H. Skilton, S K I L T O N. And I am also at skiltongram on Instagram. Those are my two hangouts for the most part.

Andrea Martucci: Awesome. And do you have any books out recently?

Sarah Skilton: My most recent was called Hollywood Ending, and it was a co written rom com. This actually applies. It's about two college best friends. A boy and a girl, Sebastian and Nina, who were super fans of a Game of Thrones type show when they were in the dorms together. And they had a falling out before they graduated, but now it's five years later and they both have an opportunity to work behind the scenes of a reboot of their favorite fantasy TV [01:12:00] show.

He's production assistant and she is in marketing and social media, and they reconnect and become roommates and they're finally ready to risk their friendship in case it might be the best love story of all so that's hollywood Ending

Andrea Martucci: and that's, under the pen name....

Sarah Skilton: Tash Skilton. So we took our two last names and mushed them together.

Kind of like Christina Lauren did or Fleetwood Mac, whichever you prefer.

Andrea Martucci: Sarah, thank you so much for pushing me off the parapet to read this book. And It was a dragon ride.

So,

Sarah Skilton: a dragon ride and I really appreciate you having this discussion. I was, so curious what you would think. So this was a lot of fun for me.

Andrea Martucci: Hey, thanks for spending time with me today. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate or review on your favorite podcast app or tell a friend. Check out Shelflovepodcast.com for transcripts and other resources. If you want regular written updates from Shelf Love, you can increasingly find me over at Substack.

Read occasional updates and short essays about romance at shelflovepodcast.Substack.com. Thank you to Shelf Love's $20 a month Patreon supporters: Gail, Copper Dog Books, and Frederick Smith. Have a great day.