A striking fantasy told with skill. The protagonists span a thousand years, a take where distance on paper may sound hard to relate to, however this book just works.

The world building was tactile, I soon stopped reading the words and found myself moving through the story.

There were brilliant relationships and fast paced action scenes, and protagonist that you loved, or were impressed by. Looking forward to reading the next in the series. What a treat!

It was very difficult to rate this book. I kept going back and forth between 3 stars and 4, even now I'm wondering if I rated it right according to my feelings.
First of all the stories are wonderful! The main characters each had their own traits that made them incredibly fierce. Eliana's character was probably one of my favorites. In a world where we are used to seeing books with heroines, it's refreshing once in a while to get a character who's really good at being bad. A character who seems to struggle with truly knowing the difference between right and wrong. Or who does the wrong thing for the right reason.
The plot, while moving slowly at first, was gripping. Between Rielle's trials and Eliana being an assassin, there was always something going on. It was hard to feel bored after the initial first third of the book.
Here's where the three star rating comes in. Confusion. Throughout the book I kept asking myself why this wasn't two books? As the series continues to grow I'm sure we'll better understand how these two characters and their stories coincide with one another. However this book could have easily been made into two books, with very compelling arcs. Maybe then the book would not have so many mixed reviews revolving around it.
I do plan to read the next book and I'm really looking forward to it! It's something I'm anticipating! I just couldn't give this more than an average score. For some reason I really couldn't move past the frustration I was feeling over reading two totally different stories in a single book. These stories take place a thousand years apart form each other, how can they possibly meet up!? (She asked about a book with magic in it.)
I would still recommend this and say, don't give up before getting halfway through it at least.

I had a very hard time getting through this book. I liked the feminist perspective, but it was hard to keep the characters straight and didn't really care about any of the characters. I could see why some people would enjoy this but it was not for me.

A highly original fantasy story spanning centuries about two young women who must face arduous trails to save their world. I really enjoyed a lot of aspects of this story, the plot was original and fascinating, I loved the strength of the two heroines, I always love female characters who are strong and brave in their own ways but at times the story fell flat for me, I became bored and disinterested, perhaps something to do with the pacing of the novel. Overall it was an enjoyable read and I'll definitely be picking up book two when it is released.

I enjoyed Furyborn although it took me until 30% of the way to really get into it. I thought that it was a refreshingly unique fantasy story with elements of sci-fi scattered throughout. I liked the dual perspective of Rielle and Eliana and how their stories began to conned and intertwine in a unique and unexpected way. I think one of the main reasons why I didn't fully love this book was because Angel books aren't really for me. I don't know what it is but they're never something I end up loving. But I am intrigued enough to continue with this series as it had plenty of surprises to keep me reason and wanting answers. Plus I'm interested to see what's next in store for both characters.

This was one of my most highly anticipated books of 2018 but unfortunately....I was highly disappointed by it. I was expecting it to be my favorite flavor of burning hot, cup of tea, but it was not that at all.

It had an AMAZING premise, and started off extremely interesting (like I was gripped! Intrigued!), but all too soon, it fell more and more flat, and I grew more and more bored with each turn of the page.

I tried, I really did. Because I so wanted to love this book. But I just couldn't lie to myself. This book was painful to get through, especially at 400+ pages. It is unnecessarily long, and even worse, it was told through alternating viewpoints, making it feel that much longer. One character's chapters were more boring than that of the other main character's, because at least the other character had some action going on. But, on the downside, all that action was pretty pointless. So. Not much better.

I actually wanted to cry when I finished reading this, because I was so disappointed. I'm hoping that maybe there's hope for better times to come in the sequels?? And i'm not going to completely write off Claire Legrand either, because the ideas were there, and the writing had promise, it just fell flat in this particular book.

This one just wasn't for me.

I tried reading this book but sadly I didn't make it very far while reading this book. I think that the different point of views made it a bit difficult to understand . I usually love this author's books and I hoped that this one would work out for me.

I really enjoyed the duel POV’s and the concept of this YA Fantasy. I liked each character individually but wish they were more closely related. I felt that the timelines being so far apart made the book feel like it should’ve been broken into books of their own. I think because of the timeline being so far apart it caused the pacing to slow down a lot. It felt like so much information and I started to lose interest. I pushed through and enjoyed the end but there was a lot of middle going on. I’m not sure yet if I’ll read the rest of the series as it is quite the undertaking.

Reviews for this book are very polarizing. And I find merit in both sides. This book read like a high fantasy. I liked the the contrasts between the two main characters . And it was action-packed. However, some parts really missed. I either disliked them or were boring and felt unnecessary. That is my biggest criticism. The book felt unnecessarily long and became difficult to get through at time.

Very late to the reviewing party (and we all have quarantine to thank for my mass catchup), but Claire is a genius and I would die for Rielle. That is all.

Wow, wow, wow! Furyborn is absolutely one of my favorite fantasies I've read. Such a beautifully imagined world.

3 - 3.5 stars

Okay...

I loved the idea of this book. Angels, time travel, two people forced to play out their destiny for good or evil. The story immediately sucked me in, however, the book was 100 pages too long and lagged HORRIBLY in the middle. I found myself asking, "Why do I care?" multiple times around page 375-400.The dialogue in the sex scenes made me cringe. It would also be the only reason I would hesitate to adopt the title for my classroom library. Overall, I just did not care about the characters. They all fell a little flat for me. I also did not like how the mother was turned into a creature at the end. A plot twist I saw coming pretty early.

All negatives aside, I like the ideas behind the story itself and the world building but in the end could not get behind the characters. I personally won't be continuing with the series.

The alternating POVs in different time periods required quite a lot of exposition to ground the reader in the two seperate sets of stakes and get invested in the characters--I'll be recommending this book to hard fantasy fans who don't mind having to wait for the story to come along. As it is, it's not an accessible book, which is too bad because it's far more feminist than many YA fantasies.

Furyborn is the first book in the Empirium triology. It's a fantasy focused around two different women set in different times - Rielle and, 1000 years later, Eliana. There is a legend that two queens, the Sun Queen and the Blood Queen, will rise. Rielle has all 7 elemental magics that it's foretold the Queens will possess, so she undergoes a series of trials to determine which Queen she is. If she is the Blood Queen, she will be put to death. In the other storyline, Eliana has followed her mother's footsteps into the violent underworld to keep her family alive. A bunch of women have been disappearing in her city, and now her mother's gone, so she starts to investigate what's been happening.
Unfortunately, both characters are painfully unlikable. Eliana was cruel and Rielle has no control over her powers, but is hailed as in control. Both are horny as all get-out. There is very minimal world building, which makes for a very confusing story when you're rushing through action and magic the entire 500+ pages. This book was not thought out enough to warrant the length. The premise was interesting, but this was such a let down.

I don't think I've ever been so enthralled by an antihero as much as I was with Rielle. Her trials, love story, and slow succumbing to darkness were constant page turners.

I found Eliana's chapters and story a lot more challenging to get into. For me, she wasn't as engaging of a character as Rielle.

I was very disappointed in this book. It has a lot of potential but was too derivative and unimaginative for me.

Really enjoyed this one! It's an original, fast-paced start to a trilogy. I grew attached to the characters very easily and couldn't decide whose point of view I preferred.

What happened? The prologue is fierce and compelling, I devoured it way to quickly, and then chapter 1. I can't even begin to describe the feeling of dread and regret I felt as a spent 4 days trudging through the first 30 pages. I kept expecting it to get better, some high magic, high drama, high destruction, and no just burning horses and morally grey characters that were not actually morally grey. The story ended up picking up after a bit, but I don't think I was reading it, more like skimmed it but more, but not at the same time.

Rielle is introduced in the prologue, so we know quite a bit about her and where her story will end up going, but later in the story she is to be the sun, the light of their people. Eliana is the morally grey, but not really, mercenary (is that the right word for her?) from 1000 years later. I don't know which girl annoyed me more though. One is good pretending to be bad, the other is good that will be bad eventually and it all just irked me. Also, the "sex" scene, oh gah I don't think I've laughed so hard in years.

In conclusion, I will probably end up hate reading this book again so I can continue the series and hopefully get to the part of the story that the prologue shows. I swear that prologue will be with me for LIFE.

I tried to read this ARC MANY times but unfortunately I couldn't stay interested because the plot moves way to slow for my taste

I really loved this book. Claire Legrand has created a world that I got lost in. Even though the author often changed the point of view, the book was easy to follow and this added to the story. I have already downloaded the second book, Kingsbane.