Swift the Storm, Fierce the Flame

 This review will be about the book called Swift the Storm, Fierce the Flame by Meg Long. It is a fantasy, otherworld novel, the second in a series. The publication date is January 2023. 

A little about the book; Remy Castell is a genetically engineered corporate agent but her life changed two years ago on a mission. She found a friend who was able to help her overcome her programming but she was unable to save her one night. 

Ever since the mission went awry, Remy has been following a fellow genopath named Kiran Lore, her ex-teammate who left her for dead in the deep jungle when she jeopardized their mission. She wasn't fast enough to catch him on a planet called Tundar but Remy was able to make a new friend named Sena and her wolf Iska when they had to enter the sled race. Sena and Iska teamed up with Remy and tracked Kiran down to a planet called Maraas, the jungle planet where everything went wrong. A lot can change in two years and this world proves it, there's a fight brewing to stop the corpo director. Syndicates and scavvers are teaming up, which is something new, to fight the Corpo's and take back their world. Remy doesn't want to get in the middle of it though, she just wants to find her friend. But the war and the storms on Maraas are only getting stronger each day. 

When Remy, Sena, and Iska finally find Kiran, he doesn't leave her in the dust like he normally does. He offers her a deal, and Remy doesn't trust him. If Remy helps with the war, he'll take her to her friend. Can she trust him? Especially after he left her to die in the jungle all those years ago. Soon though, Remy will have to decide to help with the war to find her friend or look for her by herself. 

Alright, my favorite part of this whole thing; 

Now, don't get me wrong I absolutely loved this book but as you can see it took me a while to get it finished. I lost interest in reading it when I was about halfway through with it. It just seemed slow compared to the first book. Remy has a lot of good qualities but also some iffy ones, which I think I was getting irritated by more by her character than the actual book. I didn't feel like I could relate to her a lot throughout the book and that's usually what I love to read, books that you can relate to I guess. 

The beginning of the book is good, a little slow, but that's also building the new world so understandable. The middle is what got me in a reading slump, I just could not push myself to finish it but I'm so glad I did because I ended up actually loving the ending. The kind of animals on Maraas are so unique that I've had to reread the description of them just to kind of understand what they look like, terrifying creatures Let's just say that haha. Lots and lots of fight scenes, well not a whole lot but there are quite a few altercations, which I'm all for that action! 

*A little spoiler alert, sorry* 

My favorite scene out of the whole book has to be when Remy and Kiran go to mines and let all of the animals that were being tested on, out of their cages. It was such a strong scene to add, it tears at your emotions. 

*Spoiler over*

The writing is fantastic, even for an arc where it would have typos but nope, not this one. Meg did a good job building this world/universe. I wasn't left wondering about anything in the world/s or about the characters either, unless it was intentional. 

I give this book a rating of 8/10 stars only because it was really hard for me to continue after the middle part. Otherwise, this book and series is definitely good and I recommend it!