I'm going to say this: I'm NOT an ownvoices reviewer, but there are a few things I could relate to, which is really important. I really recommend checking out the stops on the blog tour, as they're are amazing #ownvoices reviewers on it. 

I had no idea what to expect coming into this book, and I do got to say. It does show a lot of promise of being a very good novel, but I really felt the execution of it was iffy. It was basically a gang war with Valerie debating on her loyalty to others. 

After the first two chapters, I was so impressed because I was instantly hooked onto this narrative because it showed it had so much potential, and than it kinda gone a little downhill until like the last one hundred pages, where I was hooked again. That's like what a good 250 or so pages that it felt merely okay? I don't think it's a bad thing, because Price has a lot of potential and she'll defiantly grow into an amazing author. 

The writing was a little jarring at times, and was cut around the edges, but this book has an addictive clutch to it, as I couldn't put it down as I needed to see what is going to happen. Like I said, Prince shows potential and she'll grow as an author over her future works. 

I did like the characters. They weren't amazing, but they felt real. They lacked a special connection for me to really like them, and I kinda wish some of the characters' personalities were more fleshed out. They were interesting, and real, but really wished they were more I guess? 

I want to mention one of the mental health issues, and that is self-harm. As someone who just recently broke her three year streak of being clean (luckily what mine are-are just fingernails as my mental health taken a turn for the worse). It was really important to see self-harm in fiction, but honestly her motivation and causes her to do so is not explored and I don't feel like that is proper rep. as someone who is now struggling with this issue right now.

This book was full of loss and hope. I couldn't put it down and I can't wait to see what this author releases next. This gang novel is one that reminded me of the gangs of New York and others like it. The writing was easy to follow and very engaging and although this one is not really a thriller in my book. I think that it had enough edge of your seat action to get your blood pumping. The characters shinned though the pages of this story and transported me to this light dystopian setting.

This is the kind of kick-butt heroine I want to see more of.

Don't get me wrong, I love a bow-slinging Katniss and a sword-slinging Celaena as much as the next reader, but that's not the only kind of strength. This book focuses more on mental strength and determination, and that's just as important as the physical stuff.

Our heroine, Valerie, is on a mission to avenge the murder of her brother, and absolutely nothing is going to get in her way. Not even a smokin' hot love interest.

That is probably my favourite aspect of this book. There is romance, but it doesn't take over the plot. I've seen promising heroines get neutralised by romances before, but not here. Valerie would sacrifice her romance for the sake of her mission, and I absolutely love that.

I want to see more of that kind of strength, and I'm looking forward to what Shannon Price comes up with next.


Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for sending me a complimentary copy :)

Billed as The Outsiders meets the Illiad, I can definitely see elements of both in A Thousand Fires. But this story and the writing just doesn’t resonate with me like either of those pieces. Set in modern day San Francisco, the story is about one girl’s desire to enact revenge on the gangs that have taken a part of her family away.

Valerie is bent on joining the Wars after her brother was struck down in the crossfire two years ago. Against her parents’ wishes, she drops out of high school and accepts the offer to join the splinter gang, The Stags. The Red Bridge War started when a collection of young techies banded together to consolidate power and ideas, but as their money and influence grew, another group called The Boars stepped forward to oppose the Herons. The Stags is a gang that ventured off from the two after much history and political maneuvering.

Jax is the attractive and magnetic leader of The Stags. Valerie is drawn to him but thinks she must stay true to her ex-boyfriend who has now joined The Herons, but may still keep up contact. Jax sees it as his mission to expose the truth about the Herons to the world, the fact that they have manipulated real estate deals to change the landscape of the city. He says that he will do it through peaceful means but the players don’t always play by the rules.

Part morality play and part ode to teenage rebellion, I just felt like the book lacked in so many ways. There was a lot of waiting around in the gang’s house in the plot and much of the exposition was done through info drops. Another thing I found frustrating was that several of the minor character just aren’t fleshed out very well and as the story progresses they have an impact on the book but those events don’t have the weight they should have because of the lack of characterization.

I was excited about the premise and the setting to begin with, and was even allowing to suspend disbelief for many things… but this one just fell flat for me.

2.5 out of 5 stars.

WOW! I totally devoured this book. A Thousand Fires totally blew my expectations out of the water and I'm so happy I received a copy of this book otherwise I may have not even known it was releasing. Why is there not more hype around this?! This book is pitched as The Outsiders meets The Iliad so do with that knowledge what you will, but I was more invested in this because it reminded me of something that I love dearly and that's the TV show Sons of Anarchy. I swear it's not because both gang leaders are named Jax, and this is definitely the muuuuuch tamer version of the show (watch at your own risk 🙃) but this book was still so good.

Valerie, has spent everyday since her little brother was killed by a gang called the Boars plotting her revenge. The day she turns eighteen she's hoping to get selected by the Boars rival gang, the Herons, and will one day avenge her brothers death. Val and her ex-boyfriend, Matthew, quickly rekindle their romance in the beginning of this book which definitely adds a lot of complexity to the story later on that I was LIVING for. But when Val doesn't get recruited by the Herons (Matthew does) and instead is recruited to a third gang called the Stags with a leader who promises to help her avenge her bothers death, Val knows she has no choice to but leave everyone and everything behind. And thus, begins our story of love, lies, grief, deception, found families, new and old love, testing loyalties, and the truth surrounding her brother's death.

Val's story isn't a pretty one as she tries to navigate her new life within a gang. She often finds herself questioning the gangs intentions, where her loyalty lies, and maybe even fighting some attraction to her new leader Jax, all the way fighting her love for her ex-boyfriend, Matthew. Not going to lie I definitely got some Romeo and Juliet vibes from this one too. Another reason I loved this one was because of the side characters that Val meets throughout her time as a Stag. Dare I say I loved this gang? Because I really did. I also enjoyed that Jax was trying to do good throughout this story even though he was definitely in over his head. He didn't always make the best decisions on how to deal with the Wars between the gangs, but his intention was to always make the outcome better for the greater good, much like Jax Teller, if I may add.

The one reason I didn't give this one 4.5/5 stars is because I wish the ending wasn't as rushed. The big climactic scene between all three gangs was SO GOOD and I didn't want it to end. There was definitely a lot of buildup over the first 280 pages to the final scene and the 20-ish pages just wasn't enough in my opinion. Although, I will add in that I did enjoy the way the story ended with a sense of open-endedness. Some people hate endings like that but personally when we're dealing with books centered on heavy topics I think it works so much better for a story. All in all, this was a fantastic debut from Shannon Price and I will definitely be picking up more of her books in the future!

Did someone say love? I said love. I loved this book. I can't even express how deeply I love this book. The characters made me feel everything they went through--everything. I hoped I would like this one based on the premise and I'm so glad that my expectations were not only met, but exceeded. Shannon Price nailed it. I cannot recommend highly enough.

A few months back, I read Beth O’Leary’s The Flatmate and, in that, there’s an emotionally abusive ex boyfriend. Throughout a good chunk of the second half of the book, I had this constant sense of unease that he was about to do something awful to the MC (which he subsequently did). That sense of unease is very much the same feeling I had reading this book, although I’m not entirely sure it was intentional in this case.

To give you a summary of the plot: for some (to be later explained) reason, there are gang wars in the city. Also for some reason (not explained), the gangs go around picking up new recruits who have to commit to the gang for at least a year (like some kind of messed-up national service). Val’s brother was killed by the gang wars a few years back and she’s determined to find out who did it, even if it means joining the gangs herself. Only, instead of joining the Herons as she expected, she gets picked up by the Stags. And their (as the blurb states) “charismatic and volatile” leader (who just so happens to be the hottest guy Val has ever seen and you can probably hear me rolling my eyes at this point).

I won’t pretend like I was enjoying this book at the start. It opened with a number of things that made me roll my eyes (again). Like the fact that you know there’s going to be a love triangle from the moment Val meets Jax, that her ex is in a rival gang so it’s going to be all cliched Romeo & Juliet, the fact that I couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be a dystopia or a contemporary or what. And also the fact that, from the start, Jax treated Val like shit and I thought oh here we go again, another dickhead LI who’s going to be excused with a tragic backstory.

Only, Jax is more than just a dickhead LI. You know there’s your common or garden dickhead LI, who is basically just rude to the MC, but ultimately not much more. But then there’s the actually abusive dickhead LI, and Jax fell squarely into that category.

I think I first started to feel uncomfortable about Jax when he pushed Val into a wall and threatened her, all because she didn’t follow an order. And that’s within the first quarter of the book, easily.

But it didn’t end there.

When the Stags take Val, they ostensibly save her from an attack by the Boars, who point a gun to her head, threatening to kill her. However (and there are spoilers here), it’s later revealed that they weren’t the Boars, but the Stags. And that the attack was all staged by Jax. To which, Val has a very reasonable response.

“You’re insane,” I say. A flood of worry hits me and I tack on a “sorry”.

That she feels the need to apologise to him for this, for having an actually pretty understated response to being attacked by him, because she worries he might snap. The red flags are coming out, folks.

But that’s not all because, a few chapters later, there’s this:

I think Jax may actually kill me if he finds out I’ve left again.

This isn’t a reasonable reaction to someone disobeying orders unless you’re some kind of dictator. Especially not in a “gang war”, which is starting to look more and more like just kids running around the streets because they’re bored.

But, you guessed it, there’s still more! Firstly, now whenever Val disobeys an order from Jax and he finds out, she goes to him, expecting to be punished and babbling excuse and then is grateful when she’s not punished. Because Jax has a pattern in this book. Punishment followed by piecemeal affection. He lashes out by breaking things, he hits someone who even thinks about leaving the gang, they worry about ruining his good moods, always apologise first even when he’s in the wrong, and yet, because he’s nice to Val once in a blue moon, he’s not a villain.

Tell me how I’m supposed to view this as anything but textbook abusive behaviour.

The thing is, part of me wants to believe that this was actually all intentional, that Jax was always meant to be read as abusive. But there’s no condemnation of his behaviour. Yeah, so it’s not romanticised really, but it’s also not condemned in the narrative. So even if the intention was there, it hasn’t translated onto the page that well (I mean, death of the author and all that). (There are more quotes in the twitter thread I made.)

So, the prevailing reason for how much I disliked this book was Jax. Take Jax out, and maybe I would have liked it more. But there were also the issues I had with the worldbuilding and plot more generally. Firstly, it never feels like there are any stakes to this world. Someone gets shot, and I still didn’t feel like there were stakes. I think part of that was because of the backstory for how the gang wars started. This book is comped to The Iliad and The Outsiders but it feels a whole lot more like Romeo & Juliet from the other characters’ POV. And that could have been good! But combine that with the various reasons why people are fighting, particularly Jax’s (can I say bored rich kid?), and it just doesn’t have any impetus to it. (And don’t get me started on how all the Stags seem to do is use social media to start protests. Another thing that could have been good but ended up flopping.)

Secondly, the book’s ostensibly about Val’s quest to avenge her brother’s death, but from the point where Jax tells her he knows who did it, but he’s not gonna say until she’s earned his trust (yet more evidence of him being abusive, no?), she just seems to accept that and never bothers trying to find out herself. Which leads me to question what this book is actually about. It’s almost like it’s trying to be too many things at once and not doing any of them in enough depth.

Ultimately, then, this book ended up disappointing me. Despite how good it sounded, it never lived up to all that.

I have not read the Iliad nor have I read the outsiders, so any comparisons between this book and those two works were lost on me.

This had an interesting premise but quickly went downhill. None of the characters are fully fleshed out and I don’t know what most of their motivations were, there were many plot inconsistencies and things that just did not make any sense. The relationship between the main character and Jax was based on absolutely nothing. I have no idea why they were suddenly so physical with each other or why they liked each other. The big reveals made absolutely no sense. This was incredibly disappointing and I think just ultimately suffered from poor plot planning and a lack of good editing. Two stars.

I didn't get very far into this book. The writing felt clunky and I was having a hard time connecting with the characters. Thank you to the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book, but it was not for me.

I loved this book! I had just read a heavy information dump fantasy novel, and this book was a refreshing break. The story has three different gangs in it, but the Boars felt like an added thought for me. If it was just a story about the Herons and the Stags, I feel like it would've been better overall. The part where Micah gets mistakenly killed because he was wearing Jax's jacket was not a surprise at all. It was heavily foreshadowed, and I wish it was more of a shocker like it was for the other characters in the book. Besides those two issues, though, I really did enjoy reading this book.

San Francisco isn’t the safest place to live since the time the first gang called Herons appeared on its streets. The richest people of the town were leading the town, and no one was able to stop them until the new group Boars were formed just to stop them. It was their main purpose in the end but with the time they lost it and became even more dangerous to the city. They started the dangerous game Wars.

With the years the new gang came to the city. No one knew who they are exactly and on which side they are. Some say they are the most dangerous ones, but no one knew the truth. They are called the Stags.
On the day of the 18th birthday of the people living in the city. The gangs could recruit them to take part in the Wars for a year. If you are in, you cannot leave, that’s the main rule. The Wars are dangerous, and everyone knows the cost of taking part in it. It also gives you a house and the money that a lot of recruits need.

Valerie for the last years planned to join Herons because of what happened to her brother. She was looking for revenge, but the police couldn’t identify the person who killed her little brother. The only way to find the guilty person was joining the Wars. When she turned eighteen one of the gangs found and recruited her. The only problem was that it wasn’t the group that she wanted to join. She wasn’t sure if she should do it but when the leader of the group promised her to reveal who murdered her brother, she didn’t hesitate any longer. She became one of the Stags.

My thoughts:

I cannot find words to describe how much I enjoyed this book. It was brilliant. The story, characters and their history together made the book perfect. I honestly couldn’t put it down. I wanted the story to go on and never end. I wish the author will write a continuation of the story because a lot of things were not explained, and I want to know what happens to everyone in the future.

Besides being a great read, the book was also heartbreaking. I look back to it and most of the characters were broke inside and there is nothing that can fix what happened to them. Valerie is one who will never be the same girl as she was before she lost her brother and the Wars. It’s not possible to recover after it. For some reason, she annoyed me in this book but it’s only because she was scared to lose more than she already did. She was very determined. Even if she was scared, felt alone and out of place, she still stayed and fought to reach her goal.

Jay is a very complicated character in the book. He makes you love him and hate him at the same time. He went through a lot and I feel like a lot of people disappointed him. That’s why he wants to do everything his way so it will never happen again. He trusts only his close friends/gang members and maybe his mother, but I think it’s more complicated between them.

I think Micah is my favorite of all. He is a friend/boyfriend everyone wishes to have. He is caring, kind and down-to-earth. He didn’t let the Wars change him. He was the one who wanted to leave it the most. He didn’t want to leave his friends and that was the reason why he wanted the Wart to finally end. I wish he could play a bigger part in this story. He deserved better than he had.

I don’t know if you also were fans of fanfictions when you were younger, but I loved them more than books when I was 13-14. My favorite ones were the ones about gangs and dangerous love. When I read this book, it takes me back to this time. It’s very similar but ten times better and much better written.
The last thing I would like to talk about is the short love plot. That’s the part I was a little bit disappointed. I wished it would develop more and we will get more stories about it but as fast it came the same way it was gone. I need more of them. As much as I like the ending, I want to change it. I don’t even need a change I just need a happy end for them.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Shannon Price and Tor Books for providing me a digital copy of this book. I was more than happy to read it and review it.

This book was received as an ARC from Macmillan-Tor/Forge in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.

I could not stop reading this book, the action, the drama, the conflict evolving for Valerie and her family was so breathtaking that it knock my socks off right away. First off, it's about time that a female heroine is named Valerie. Valerie is a powerful name and boy did she fit her role well. This reminded me a lot of Divergent but more dramatic and more intense which made me enjoy it more. Valerie's determined to seek vengeance of her brother's death in that she is joining the elite group of Herons with her boyfriend but when a leader of a competitive group gives her an offer she can't refuse, she is dealt a difficult choice between family and vengeance. I was left speechless and breathless and I know our teen book club will love this title too.

We will consider adding this title to our YA collection at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.

Loved this book, It was so fun to read! I hope there is a book two because the book was just that god! I Cried in some parts! It was amazing!

When I started this book I found myself really enjoying it. I loved the concept and was constantly rooting for Valerie to get revenge on the person who killed her brother.

However, the more I read the more I felt disconnected from this book. I felt that it was extremely slow at points only to be incredibly rushed at the end leaving you with no real closure. You never got to really learn about any of the main characters, especially Jax who just fluttered in and out when the story needed him to. Relationships weren’t developed and just felt out of place. I felt no connection to the storyline and would have liked to have a lot more backstory in terms of the wars and the motives behind certain characters behaviour.

When I finished this book I thought for sure it was going to have a sequel but apparently it’s a stand alone which leaves readers feeling empty. While Shannon Price has created this world I feel like she’s left so many open ends and in my opinion I feel like there is so much more she could do with this story.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Ok I read the preview provided on Netgalley so was quite intrigued to see where this story would go. Essentially we have Valerie who dearly wants more than anything to find out which gang member killed her brother. Her chance to finally find out is crushed when instead of being offered a position with the Herons she suddenly finds herself taken by the Stags ! Not what Valerie wanted but their unpredictable leader offers to help her so Valerie leaves behind her safe world and enters one full of secrets, deceit and danger.
I really wanted to like this as I thought the idea of Gangs reminded me of West Side Story and obviously Romeo and Juliet. I will say because Valerie is in love with Matthew the idea of star crossed lovers did crop up but sadly it didn't actually go in the direction I'd hoped for. Valerie and Jax just never made sense to this reader as he wasn't developed enough. Plus the three gangs and the power they had really wasn't that believable. This is a standalone book so expect Valerie to get revenge but the cost is hard leaving this reader feeling empty.
This voluntary take is of a copy I requested from Netgalley and my thoughts and comments are honest and I believe fair

DNF @ 40%
Look, I tried my best to get into this book but I just couldn't do it. I'll chop it down to it just not being the kind of book for me, along with a few other issues, such as:
- Characters being one dimensional
- Minute details (no one cares about a characters daily, mundane routine)
- Deadend plot
- Childish dialogue (I know teenagers will be teenagers but even I spoke better than this at their age during the book)
- A guy is "the hottest they've ever seen" bullshit. Spare me. Please!

I'm not one to mince my words, as anyone will know, but the first 20% of the book...literally nothing happens except that Valerie joins one of the 3 gangs, the Stags. After that, when revelations being to randomly spew forth, I couldn't have cared less by that time. I will not give a long and drawn out review; it simply isn't worth it at this point, and I don't care to give much more thought on this book.

Also, trigger warning: depression and cutting.

Gang wars, revenge, and volatile leaders?  As a Sons of Anarchy fan, I couldn't wait to read this (even though the gangs aren't MCs).

First, let me say that it took enormous effort on my part to put down my Kindle while reading this - I was riveted.  Valerie losing her younger brother is a tragic story, and her warring emotions are well-portrayed.  Important topics such as depression, cutting, and talk of suicide are also addressed.  While much of this book is very dark, having a supportive circle of family and friends is emphasized.  The origin of the gangs is explained well, and the Stags fight against gentrification is understandable.  I found myself rooting for them - just maybe not all the methods they use in their fight.

While I felt I knew Valerie and Micah pretty well, when it came to Jax, there were still several blank spaces by the end of the book.  Valerie's feelings for him seemed to be based on nothing more than his looks and the information he possessed that she wanted.  He's an interesting character, and I craved more details.  The Westons and their influence were also a gray area for me, and more explanation of their involvement would have helped.

Taking the subject matter into account, don't expect a unicorns and rainbow-type of ending, but many things are resolved.  With a compelling tale involving themes of family, revenge, betrayal, and grief, this is a fantastic debut novel, and I'll be looking for future books by this author.  

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

A Thousand Fires is the debut novel of Shannon Price, and is a novel worth checking out. It's a modern-day retelling of The Iliad, with a touch of The Outsiders thrown into the mix. Naturally, that has a lot of readers more than a little bit curious about this one.
In a world where three gangs rule the land, everything is both familiar and dangerous. On your eighteenth birthday, you stand a chance of picking recruited by one of three gangs. If recruited, you're expected to put in a year with them. You cannot leave. You cannot run.
The Herons are the most organized gang of the three. They've got their hands on corporations and politicians. As such, they tend to rule the roost. The Boars are wild and loud, and will do what it takes the stop the Herons from getting bigger. And then there are the Stags. They're the smallest, and some people even believe that they don't exist. Their goals are much more obfuscated than the other two.
Ten years ago Valerie Simons lost her little brother to a gang war. A Boar gang member killed him, even though he was just a kid. Ever since then, Valerie has been working towards getting herself recruited by the Herons so she could get her revenge.
Only, she wasn't recruited by the Herons. Instead, the Stags came to her. And they offered her the chance at revenge that she so desperately wanted. All she has to do is earn their trust before they'll give her a name. Just one name, and she'll get the man who murdered her brother.

“Eighteen – old enough to have had your heart hardened, young enough that blood still passes through it.”

Warnings: This is probably fairly obvious, but this novel contains more than one example of gang violence within its pages. It's never gratuitous, for what it is worth.

A Thousand Fires was a magnificent and emotionally compelling novel. It's a prime example of a character driven plot, with Valerie's pain and determination driving her and the plot forward. It was impossible not to feel the pain and anger she was suffering from, while also hoping that she would find a better path in life.
As a fan of both The Iliad and The Outsiders, I knew that I had to give this novel a chance. Now that I've read it, I can honestly say that it lived up to all of my expectations. You can see the influences here, naturally. But it also felt very much like its own beast as well. The end result was something both unique and amazing.
Valerie's character was dynamic and vibrant. Her pain felt real – like it was emanating from the pages. Watching her get into something over her head made for an interesting read, even if there were times where I felt like screaming at her (have you ever watched a movie and wanted to warn the characters about what was about to happen? It's like that).
The secondary characters were equally interesting. The romantic subplot(s) added a lot to Valerie's story...and her confusion. It was a perfect touch. And of course, it helped to add emotional tension to what was happening.
Part of me is actually a little bit sad that A Thousand Fires is a standalone novel. I would have happily read a second novel in this series. And even a third. I guess that just means I'll have to check out whatever Shannon Price comes out with next.

Valerie has known for the last two years that she will join the Herons on her eighteenth birthday and avenge her younger brother's death by gang crossfire. When she is recruited by the Stags instead, Valerie must readjust her expectations for revenge and work within the Gang Wars structure. Will she ever find out who killed her brother?

I really liked the premise of this book and thought it would appeal to reluctant readers. The gang violence certainly will appeal, but I'm not sure that the Gang Wars backstory is believable enough to sell to teens. Ultimately I had mixed feelings about the ending, even though I think some readers will like it.

I'm somewhere between 3-3.5 stars on this one.

The idea of making a blended retelling of The Illiad and The Outsiders is creative, ambitious, and intriguing, and while I respect what the author created here, I think my preconceived notions gave me different expectations of what this would be. I had a difficult time connecting with the characters, and the narrative felt a bit uneven and jarring, but I couldn't put this down! I'm a sucker for anything that involves gangs, and the author shows tremendous promise in her writing capabilities here. While I wasn't completely sold on A Thousand Fires, I do think there is a reader base who will adore the story Price has created, and I'm all about checking out her next book and seeing the growth she makes between now and then.