The Girl of Fire and Thorns

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

by Rae Carson

Narrated by Jennifer Ikeda

Unabridged — 12 hours, 10 minutes

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

by Rae Carson

Narrated by Jennifer Ikeda

Unabridged — 12 hours, 10 minutes

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Overview

“Rae Carson has proved she's a master and has shaken up the YA genre.”-USAToday.com

The first book in Rae Carson's award-winning and New York Times-bestselling trilogy! The Girl of Fire and Thorns is a sweeping journey full of adventure, sorcery, heartbreak, and power. Fans of Shadow & Bone and Game of Thrones, will devour this fantasy series.

Once a century, one person is chosen for greatness.

Elisa is the chosen one. But she has always felt powerless, useless. Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king-a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs her to be the chosen one, not a failure of a princess.

And he's not the only one who seeks her. Fierce enemies, seething with dark magic, are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people's savior. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake.

Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the prophecy is fulfilled. If she finds the power deep within herself. If she doesn't die young. Most of the chosen do.

William C. Morris YA Debut Award Finalist

YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Top Ten Pick

Andre Norton Award Finalist

A Texas Tayshas Selection

Ohioana Book Award YA winner

Don't miss The Empire of Dreams, Rae Carson's action-packed return to the world of The Girl of Fire and Thorns!


Editorial Reviews

OCTOBER 2012 - AudioFile

Jennifer Ikeda’s presentation of Elisa transforms with the metamorphosis of this spoiled and unhappy princess. Elisa was born with the godstone embedded in her navel and is thus marked as the one person in the century who is destined to do great deeds for her people. When she is married off to a man in a neighboring kingdom for political ends, her pampered life ends. As Elisa tells her story, Ikeda infuses her with wonder and a range of conflicting emotions but also with an underlying strength that makes her transformation believable. She is at one moment a naïve, pampered princess and the next a strong queen facing mortal danger with assurance and conviction. J.E.M. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine

Publishers Weekly

Carson debuts with a smart, complex fantasy with stellar characters, first in a planned trilogy. Even though she bears the mysterious and rare Godstone, 16-year-old Princess Elisa has been a disappointment to her family and country. Plain, overweight, and unmotivated, she is content to wed a handsome neighboring king to cement an alliance. After an arduous journey to her new home, Elisa arrives to find that her husband wants to keep their status hidden. But there are more pressing concerns—the enemy is preparing to invade, and Elisa is kidnapped. As she is thrust into a fight for survival on the borders of her new kingdom, Elisa is hunted by dark magicians and must piece together clues to fulfill her divine decree. Elisa is a sensational heroine, striving to fulfill her potential under perilous circumstances, while realistically growing in resourcefulness, inner strength, and intelligence. The odd nature of the Godstone (which is embedded in Elisa's stomach) may occasionally pull some readers out of the story, but Carson's mature writing style, thoughtful storytelling, appealing characters, and surprising twists add up to a page-turner with broad appeal. Ages 12–up. (Sept.)

Sarah Prineas

Distinctive for its luminous prose, its hint of romance, and Elisa, a strong, smart heroine that readers will truly fall in love with.

Paolo Bacigalupi

A delicious debut.

Leah Cypess

Set in intrigue-filled courts, battlefields, and windswept deserts, this riveting fantasy tests its heroine’s limits as she struggles to fulfill a destiny wrapped in an ancient mystery. A breathtaking adventure in a fascinating, richly-drawn world.

Megan Whalen Turner

Rae Carson’s heroine is a perfect blend of the ordinary and the extraordinary. I loved her.

Cinda Williams Chima

I LOVED this book! It’s a transformation story that both teens and adults can believe in. Rae Carson has delivered a unique magical system and built a world with strong series potential.

Veronica Roth

I stayed up until 2AM reading this last night. Intense, unique. . . . Definitely recommended.

Tamora Pierce

Elisa is a wonderful, believable hero, the kind that every reader can imagine as herself. I charged through the book in two days, savoring Elisa’s realness and her unique, wonderful world! Engrossing.

Locus

With The Girl of Fire and Thorns, Carson joins the ranks of writers like Kristin Cashore, Megan Whalen Turner, and Tamora Pierce as one of YA’s best writers of high fantasy.

School Library Journal

Gr 7 Up—This compelling first book in a medieval fantasy trilogy features Elisa, a 16-year-old princess, as she grows from an inexperienced girl who is forced to marry a weak king for political reasons into a confident and capable young woman, destined to be a respected leader in her own right. Shortly after her birth, Elisa received a magical Godstone in her navel, a sign bestowed every 100 years on a chosen one. Despite this, she feels inadequate when compared to her older, more beautiful sister so she eats to compensate for it. She's also very clever, particularly in the strategies of war, but all that most people see is her ample size. The only person who respects her is young Lord Hector, her husband's personal guard. Shortly after her wedding, she's kidnapped and forced to endure an arduous journey through the desert that toughens her. One of her kidnappers is a young man who falls for her and she for him. His people hope that she, as the Godstone bearer, can save them from their constant war against a neighboring enemy. This fast-moving and exciting novel is rife with political conspiracies and machinations. Elisa's maturation and physical transformation echo Catherine Gilbert Murdock's Princess Ben (Houghton Harcourt, 2008). Fans of Tamora Pierce's "Beka Cooper" series (Random) will find a kindred spirit in Elisa as she experiences great adversity and heart-wrenching loss.—Sharon Rawlins, New Jersey State Library, Trenton

Kirkus Reviews

Adventure drags our heroine all over the map of fantasyland while giving her the opportunity to use her smarts.

Elisa—Princess Lucero-Elisa de Riqueza of Orovalle—has been chosen for Service since the day she was born, when a beam of holy light put a Godstone in her navel. She's a devout reader of holy books and is well-versed in the military strategy text Belleza Guerra, but she has been kept in ignorance of world affairs. With no warning, this fat, self-loathing princess is married off to a distant king and is embroiled in political and spiritual intrigue. War is coming, and perhaps only Elisa's Godstone—and knowledge from the Belleza Guerra—can save them. Elisa uses her untried strategic knowledge to always-good effect. With a character so smart that she doesn't have much to learn, body size is stereotypically substituted for character development. Elisa's "mountainous" body shrivels away when she spends a month on forced march eating rat, and thus she is a better person. Still, it's wonderfully refreshing to see a heroine using her brain to win a war rather than strapping on a sword and charging into battle.

Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel, reminiscent of Naomi Kritzer's Fires of the Faithful (2002), keeps this entry fresh. (Fantasy. 12-14)

Product Details

BN ID: 2940173459015
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date: 07/24/2012
Series: Girl of Fire and Thorns Series , #1
Edition description: Unabridged
Sales rank: 1,061,712
Age Range: 12 - 17 Years
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