Recommended by the Reviewers Club
Fire is the third book in the Elements collection. John does not disappoint with this one. Although Fire is much more disturbing than the other elements previously written. Each of the books has a connection to the previous book and the themes are always central to violence in youth sexual assault and/or rape.
Fire is a psychological thriller that occurs over a period of 24 years and is told over what feels like six weeks. A brilliant book for any book club to generate ideas on nature over nurture. This story is about Freya, a 34-year-old well respected burns surgeon at a major hospital. That’s who she is on the outside.
However, on the inside she is an abandoned, unwanted pregnancy to a young, unmarried, teenage girl who is raised by her grandmother. At the age of 12, she is repeatedly raped and assaulted by 14-year-old twin boys and left to die as they buried her alive in a makeshift coffin.
Freya lives through her ordeal but decides to live out her life secretly taking revenge on innocent 14-year-old boys. Until one of the boys seeks her out when he is older and reveals the monster she really is.
The theme of the book suggests that trauma from rape and violent events can manifest into severe and dangerous psychological changes in a person causing them to commit harm as was done to them, or they can remain as moral human beings and choose not to act on their fantasises of violent behaviours.
Although difficult in parts to read due to the violence, still a brilliant literary read. I look forward to reading the fourth element, Air.
4.6/5 Stars