Fire Colour One by Jenny Valentine

Title: Fire Colour One

Author: Jenny Valentine

Publisher: Harper Collins UK/Harper Collins Children's Books

Genre: Teens & YA
Paperback/256 pages

Publication Date: 2 July 2015

Iris's father, Ernest, is at the end of his life and she hasn't even met him. Her best friend, Thurston, is somewhere on the other side of the world. Everything she thought she knew is up in flames. Now her mother has declared war and means to get her hands on Ernest's priceless art collection. But Ernest has other ideas. There are things he wants Iris to know after he's gone. And the truth has more than one way of coming to light.

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I usually prefer to read non-fiction books, but this summer I’ve really been enjoying a bit of escapism and getting lost in a good fiction book. While chick-lit has been occupying the most space on my nightstand, YA has been hanging out as well.

I’ve seen quite a lot of hype about Fire Colour One and decided that it was worth the read. They say not to judge a book by its cover, but this cover drew me in so I felt I had to read it. My expectations of Fire Colour One were quite high based on the good reviews, hype, and reception it's received. 

Did it live up to the expectations?

Overall, Fire Colour One was an entertaining read, the characters were elaborate and actually had quite some character. Each of them brought their own personality to the mix. They ranged from a gold-digger to a teenage pyromaniac who loves fires and art more than she loves much else (independent to her love for her male best friend, of course).

It was refreshing to see that Iris was quite different to the other teen aged protagonists I’ve read before. Sure, there’s always an angst ridden teenager in a book that will then make it to the big screen, but Iris isn’t just quirky, she’s different in a way that you just can’t put your finger on. At different parts of the book I was captivated by her compulsion to set things alight, as well as quite perplexed about it to the point that I felt she was a bit one dimensional.

The book was captivating and led me to want more, but even though the ending was one that I didn’t see coming there were gaps in the book that were never quite filled in for me. Though this book isn’t aimed at my demographic, I quite enjoyed being able to devour it in a few hours, and felt that even though there was something missing for me, it still delivered.

Overall I enjoyed the book. It was well written, and the characters were developed in a very realistic way, even though wealth and fine art aren’t part of everyone’s every day lives it still managed to make the characters be at least a bit relatable. 

Rating: 3.5