Book Review

Phoenix Unbound by Grace Draven

CW/TW for mentions of violence, rape, and abuse both in the book and in this review.

Phoenix Unbound is a brand new fantasy romance from Grace Draven and the start to a new series. While the world building is fantastic, the pacing greatly affected my reading experience. I also want to warn that I’m going to spoil some elements of this book because some things are integral in discussing my feelings. Also, please keep the content warnings above in mind. This book is graphic and violent; it may not be for everyone, especially right now.

Every year, the Empire sacrifices women from the cities and villages under their command. The villages send a woman from their population to be burned alive in an arena full of cheering spectators. The purpose of this is to appease the gods for another fruitful year. Gilene is one of these women, but the twist is that she’s been sent to the Rites of Spring for several years. Harnessing the power of illusion and fire, she’s able to disguise herself year after year and become impervious to fire.

Her village hides their line of fire witches and every generation a new one is born. The old witch sacrificed to the Rites of Spring teaches the new witch and the cycle continues. For Gilene, her sacrifices aren’t necessarily altruistic, as if she refuses, her family will be threatened or worse.

To make this situation even more awful, there are gladiators that fight to the death the day before the Rites of Spring ceremony. For their victories, they are rewarded with the sacrificial women. They take their pick and rape them (obviously, some sex could be consensual, but keep in mind these women are captives). So every year, Gilene is raped and sent to burn. While she does survive the fires, her magic comes at a price. After she expends her magical energy, she needs to recuperate her magical stores and her body seems to burn from the inside, making her blistered and feverish for days. Plus, I can only imagine the emotional turmoil given that she is raped yearly.

Azarion is the Prime Gladius, the best gladiator. He’s been a slave to the Empire for a decade and has competed as a gladiator in the Rites of Spring for three years. He is frequently raped and abused by the empress. It’s because of Gilene that he entered the Rites of Spring competitions, as he’s able to see through her glamour. He sees her as a way out of slavery. Because he’s the Prime, he’s able to take his first pick of women before the Rites of Spring burning and he chooses Gilene. Essentially, he blackmails her into helping him escape: help him get out or he’ll reveal her secret.

Of course, they manage to escape the Empire, but Azarion keeps Gilene for himself, preventing her from returning to her family. He needs her further help in regaining his birthright and he can only do that if he has the support of a fire witch. His people revere a goddess of fire known as Agna and are guided by the Fire Council, comprised of nine fire maidens. Ten years ago, his cousin had him beaten and sold off so he could rule their clan instead and now Azarion is out for revenge. Gilene is powerless for the time being, but Azarion promises to return her to her village before the next spring if she helps him. And there we have the setup.

Whew.

I’ve read a few of Draven’s others books and she can craft a wonderful story. The detail when creating new worlds and cultures is what draws me to her stories time and time again, and Phoenix Unbound is no different. Each place Azarion and Gilene travel to is distinct and I wanted to know more and more about the world in which they live.

But there’s definitely an unevenness to Azarion and Gilene’s journey. The book can be broken down into distinct sections: Escaping the Empire, journeying to the Sky Below (Azarion’s home), life in Sky Below, attacking the Empire, and the reunion/aftermath. Both the road trip to Sky Below and time spent there until Azarion can regain his place as his clan’s chieftain take up a bulk of the book, especially the road trip. And well…I started skimming at times. I was also somewhat disappointed at how quickly and easily Azarion was able to take down the Empire. The same goes for Gilene and Azarion’s HEA.

Show Spoiler
He thinks she’s dead for months, but this time is incredibly condensed. Their separation and reunion happens in less than a chapter.

The romance is a slow one. If you like a slow burn, this one is definitely for you, and I loved seeing the growth from enemies to unlikely friends to something more. But if you’re impatient, I want to warn that the relationship doesn’t really start going anywhere until you’re over halfway finished. I was honestly fine with the relationship progression as there were so many other things going on to keep my reading brain occupied.

The thing that bothered me the most and kept me from really becoming invested in the romance for most of the book was Azarion. As I mentioned before, the gladiators rape the women before they are sent to death, and Azarion has taken part in these rites for at least three years. A majority of the book, I spent time wondering what sort of choices he made. Did he also rape these women? Even if he didn’t force anyone, these women really aren’t in a position to refuse. Because I couldn’t stop thinking about this detail, it was hard to root for a romantic resolution. A kidnapping plot doesn’t rankle me so much, but a hero being a rapist even under duress is something I cannot accept.

It isn’t until much, much later in the book that this addressed.

Show Spoiler
He says he has never raped a woman and did nothing untoward to the spring sacrifices. Which, good. But that could have been clarified a hell of a lot sooner because suspecting the hero of being a rapist for most of the book is not a good look. Not now. Not ever.

I don’t want to make it seem like I didn’t enjoy this book. I did, but I didn’t hit that point until a lot later than I wanted. Three-quarters in and I was flipping pages like crazy to find out what happened next: Gilene and Azarion are getting moon-eyed for each other, Gilene’s time at Sky Below is coming to an end, and Azarion is so close to regaining his birthright. Unfortunately, I had to do a lot of negotiating with myself to get there.

There is one other thing that didn’t bother me, but I know will bother other readers. Frequently on the site and especially in the comments section, we discuss fertility in romance and baby epilogues. Gilene believes she is barren because of her magic and because she’s never become pregnant. I’m going to assume she’s had consensual sex because I don’t want to believe rape has been her only experience.

Show Spoiler
However, after sacrificing herself to the goddess Agna at the climax of the book, the goddess in turn gives her the ability to conceive. It’s unclear whether she’s pregnant by the end of the book, but she is at the very least granted fertility. 

While I can give or take a pregnancy plot, I want everyone else to be aware this happens, especially if you hate this trope or are particularly sensitive to issues of infertility.

This is the first in a series, but I don’t know if I’ll continue. The romance thread is pretty resolved by the end; Azarion and Gilene are happy and have professed their love. There are some political and magical plots unresolved, but I suppose I don’t care enough about them to where I felt any cliffhanger anxiety.

As a fantasy romance, the book is more of the former and takes quite some time to get to the latter. And despite the great detail and care taken in creating this world and its characters, reading Phoenix Unbound was an exercise in patience.

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Phoenix Unbound by Grace Draven

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  1. DonnaMarie says:

    Has to be said: STOP COPYING ME!!

  2. Ren Benton says:

    I bought this on release day because I’ve been craving fantasy romance, but I haven’t gotten around to reading it yet. These are good, non-ruinous spoilers. As for the lack of cliffhanger anxiety: good. That particular marketing tactic backfires spectacularly on me. It’ll probably get bumped behind Talia Hibbert’s rapist-eating werewolf in the queue, but it’s high in my TBR priorities.

  3. Amanda says:

    @DonnaMarie: We’re book twins!

  4. I quite enjoyed this one by the end, but hoo-boy, it really does need all of the content warnings. I seriously considered DNFing it in the first 10%, as it consists almost entirely of rape scenes or the threat of rape on and off page. Please be gentle with yourself if you think this is going to be a problem for you, because in a different mindset, this could have been really derailing for me. I also agree that there are some real pacing issues here, which I can only assume are because this is a first book in a series? I had some skimming sections

    That said, I absolutely loved the world building, and I appreciated the character development for the h/h, individually and together. I also chose to think of this as primarily a book about two survivors of sexual assault & abuse (because however Gilene’s hometown & family tries to spin it, they’ve enslaved her into a cycle of “sacrifice” that’s actually abuse) having a slow and very imperfect romance. For me, I found that really healing this week after having to have wounds opened every time I got online or caught a headline- I want to believe that we can move past the worst moments in our lives towards something better, so that was how I chose to read this one. I especially like Gilene as a character and her slow realization of where she had agency in her life. So yeah, definitely not a perfect book or one for everyone, but a book I ultimately enjoyed and am glad I read

  5. Tina says:

    I ended up liking this one by the end a lot more than I did when I ws about 10% into it. I agree the first part was a bit of a slog and the rape stuff was a bit much for me and that isn’t even one of my triggers. I typically do not like “on the road’ stories anyway, so for so much of the first part to be about them escaping and travelling etc. I was just waiting for them to do something a bit more decisive. I actually ended up reading ahead to see when that part would be over.

    Once they got to the Sky Below, the book really picked up (about 30%) I began to enjoy it because action began to move forward.

    I also agree the ending felt rushed. I would have liked to experience more of their separation. I would have liked for the travelling to take up less page space, the time with Azurion’s people to have happened a bit earlier and lasted a bit longer and the separation given some more emotional heft. My favorite parts were the time spent with Azarion’s people.

    I didn’t ever get the sense that Azarion participated in the rites with the women, I think it was pretty heavily intimated early on that he was usually reserved for the Empress. And the only reason he was there then was that he finagled it so he could see if Gilene was who he thought she was.

    I am glad this is series because I am interested and invested enough to see what happens next.

  6. Leena says:

    I absolutely love Grace Draven so when I heard about Phoenix Unbound I was really excited. I loved that cover too. Unfortunately, actually reading it was slow going. Part of it is that I really can’t stand “traveling by horse or foot through the woods” type books. It gets so slow. I wish I would have realized that was a theme so I could temper my expectations. I love slow burns, they’re my favorite, but this one just didn’t do it for me. I’m not quite sure how to phrase it but I felt like it lacked the little moments where you can see their relationship changing. I also felt like the ending was rushed. In terms of the plot, I felt like we didn’t see enough of the “bad guys” for it to feel fully fleshed out. I think I would have liked reading more about the women of fire users and the brief mention of the draga. A thread I was expecting to go somewhere. All of this may sound like I disliked the book. It was ok just not what I’m used to from Grace Draven

  7. Brigit says:

    Good thing I came across this review before buying the book. I don’t know that I’ll ever be in the right frame of mind to enjoy reading a fiction novel about a society that has women sexually assaulted and then burned the next day for entertainment.
    I usually enjoy Grace Draven’s work, and absolutely adore Radiance. There are more for me to discover, but I’ll give this one a pass.

  8. Karenza says:

    I have to agree that this was not Grace Draven’s best. She is on auto buy and I pre-order anything she puts out but there were a few things that kept me from enjoying it as her other books. Don’t get me wrong – the writing still had her magic and compared to some of the nonsense being published it was still good but …
    – The violence was just too much. I read books to get away from reality and this brought it all crashing down. I was so not ready for that
    – The pacing – it was fast, then slow and then really slow and then extremely fast and finally the ending was … I don’t know … missing something. It was satisfying for the story-line but I sort of felt ‘huh?’ at the end.
    – There were somethings I was waiting to see played out – like the old graves the caravan folk found but it never came to fruition. Why was it there? Maybe the next story will be Healer’s one?

    I read Master of Crows each time I need solace and fulfillment. But I don’t think I will read this again.

  9. Amanda says:

    @Karenza: I totally forgot about the grave scene! Good point.

    And I assumed the next book would continue to follow Gilene and Azarion, but I hope I’m wrong. I think the Healer’s story would be great.

  10. Ren Benton says:

    I finally finished reading it. Spoilery thoughts ahoy.

    1. I wasn’t concerned about Azarion raping anybody because the Empress would want to rape HIM after these ceremonial battles, and although it was pointed out he’s learned to get it up on command as a matter of self-preservation, there’s only so much a guy can do physically after he shoots his shot. Even if he’d rushed through raping one of the sacrificial women before being summoned, he’d have been wiped out for the Empress and she’d have cut off his limp peen in a rage, so I didn’t believe there was any possibility he’d joined in the raping even before it was clarified.

    2. There was a lot of busy-ness in the middle but no CONFLICT after they escaped from that haunted city. Azarion had a plan, and everything went according to plan. Travel home, get Gilene approved by the fire witches, defeat his cousin, get support for the attack on the empire, execute the attack… check, check, check, check, check. No curveballs. No adjustments necessary. No betrayals. No unexpected opposition, and even the expected opposition was a pushover. He got hurt by a HORSE, not any of the villains!

    3. The ending made me wish I had a paper book to throw. He thought she died, she KNEW he thought she died, and she faffed around for MONTHS with the caravan. There was no sense of urgency to get back to him. Not even an attempt to send him a message! I was hoping he—since he thought she was DEAD and all—married someone else to fulfill his obligation as chieftan to continue the line, so Gilene would be forced to have a “gosh, maybe I should have put more effort into this relationship” revelation, but again, their reunion was presented as not-a-conflict. He wasn’t even mad she was just hanging out at the market stall and couldn’t be bothered to search for him or ask if anyone had seen him around. “Fa la la, I’ll just stand here and hope the guy who thinks I’m dead stumbles across me eventually.” I believed she wanted to get away from her family and village, but I didn’t buy for an instant that she wanted to be with him.

    It started off really promising, but about the time they left that haunted city, it went off the rails for me and never got back on.

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