amazing intro to an amazing series, would recommend to literally everybody i love the exploration of expectations vs reality, the major reveal about the main character's biggest insecurity at the end, and the world building is just immaculate. for my wof reviews, I'm going to say what I thought the major theme in the book was and expand on it a little. spoilers ahead! the main theme i feel in this book is "you are not what society perceives you as". I say this because clay, our protagonist, is a mudwing, who are perceived as strong warriors on the battlefield, good fighters, and especially by the guardians who didn't know any better, "violent monsters". they saw clay cracking at the other dragonets' shells and assumed it was because he was born with a violent streak, oblivious to how mudwing biology actually works. I especially love peril and clay's relationship in this book, as peril perfectly contrasts what clay thinks of himself. she embraces her inner "killer", whereas clay believes dragons should not be killers at all. i may have a bias towards peril lmaoooo she's so great in later books. her betrayal as well hits really hard as it kind of shows the dragonets that they can't trust ANYONE. it's more of a shock for clay though, since he let peril in while everyone else already decided she was a threat when they saw her on scarlet's arena. lastly i just love the end of this book. the initial heartbreak of finding out his parents do not gaf about clay, then the siblings flying after him and explaining that mudwings stick to their siblings. i also love the twinge of fear we see in the other siblings and Reed, the bigwings whose position was now iffy because they found their "real" bigwings. and clay also refusing to join them because he acknowledges that reed is the true bigwings 🥹 it just shows how big clay's heart actually is and he must be protected !!