Ignite the Fire: Inferno

Ignite the Fire: Inferno by Karen Chance
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Ugh. After Cassandra Palmer book #11 I was so angry at the characters, the author, and the series that I had to take a breather. I had even bought book #12 already but just couldn’t do that to myself at that time. In between, I dove into the Dory series that moves in a parallel to this one. That series convinced me that I should come back and “catch up” before going to the book that happens either in the same time frame or after this one (Time’s Fool). This was a mistake. This book “re-ignited” my hatred for where we are in this series, what has happened, and just this universe in general. 3 stars usually means I’m stopping the series, but the writing is OK. Honestly, I’m really struggling here with what to say about this book overall.

Did we get to a conclusion here? Yes, I think so. While we leave two main characters dangling, I’m hoping that gets somewhat resolved in the Dory book. Cassie, from my perspective, has run her course by the end. It’s the in-between parts (all 12+ hours in audible) that I really had a hard time with. For instance, there are *MULTIPLE* chapters of gang rape or rape attempts or reliving the rape that Cassie suffered through. Having to go through this was incredibly painful and traumatic. There should be a massive trigger warning at the start and maybe even a warning when we are in for MANY CHAPTERS of this. Is this necessary? What led us to a point where this is the only way through? Cassie has been through so much and this was just one more insult to the reader, from my perspective.

If I ignore the rape, which is BAD, I’m still left with a main character who takes so many side-quests, has so many side-conversations and just can’t seem to focus (we are having an ugly sweater contest, then we are ending the world again?) that it’s infuriating for most of the book. There are moments where it was nice to have a reminder of how we got here, but this book could have been half as long and cover just as much ground. If I had to summarize what actually pushed the overall plot forward, it would be the last few chapters and nothing in between. It felt like a lot of filler, and that’s coming from someone who still reads the Anita Blake books where they re-describe the eyes of each guy over and over. I want to be done with Cassie, but does that mean I need to stop the Dory books? Or can I keep going there and just stop this set? I guess I’ll find out because I just can’t go through this again.

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