Review: Burn Bright by Marianne de Pierres

Book Description via Goodreads:

Paperback, 316 pages

March 1, 2011, Random House Australia

Into a world of wild secrets and deadly pleasures comes a girl whose innocence may be her greatest strength.

In Ixion music and party are our only beliefs. Darkness is our comfort. We have few rules but they are absolute . . .

Retra doesn’t want to go to Ixion, the island of ever-night, ever-youth and never-sleep. Retra is a Seal – sealed minds, sealed community. She doesn’t crave parties and pleasure, experience and freedom.

But her brother Joel left for Ixion two years ago, and Retra is determined to find him. Braving the intense pain of her obedience strip to escape the only home she’s ever known, Retra stows away on the barge that will take her to her brother.

When she can’t find Joel, Retra finds herself drawn deeper into the intoxicating world of Ixion. Come to me, whispers a voice in her head. Who are the Ripers, the mysterious guardians of Ixion? What are the Night Creatures Retra can see in the shadows? And what happens to those who grow too old for Ixion?

Retra will find that Ixion has its pleasures, but its secrets are deadly. Will friendship, and the creation of an eternal bond with a Riper, be enough to save her from the darkness?

Listen well, baby bats. Burn bright, but do not stray from the paths. Remember, when you live in a place of darkness you also live with creatures of the dark.

Source: Borrowed from Kai (Thank you!)

My Thoughts:

Amazing! This is probably my favorite dystopian next to Wither. The great characters, the unique world and the superfluous writing captivated me. Burn Bright was easy to read. The writing seemed light and it balanced the horrifying and out of control quality of Ixion. Right from the start, de Pierres had my attention. Retra was easy to relate to. She was a very wholesome character with firm beliefs and a simple goal: to find her brother, Joel, who went to Ixion a year before she did. Her Seal training made her who she was, an innocent girl with limited knowledge about the world she was living in. I loved how she was herself, how she did not want to change her whole identity just for Ixion. But then Ixion and the people she will meet will change and influence her forever. From being a shy and hesitant Seal, she became strong and brave.

Ixion was a place of desires, pleasures and sin. It was a unique place filled with brilliant clubs and sacred churches where the youths sleep. The mode of transportation was through cable kars. It was being run by the Ripers, a group who monitored the youths and made sure that they were having fun. But did pleasure, freedom and satisfaction really come with no cost at all? The Ripers were not who they seemed to be. They were mysterious, unpredictable and strong. Modai, the Riper that Retra first met in the barge, had been watching her. But Modai was not the only one of his kind, others had noticed Retra too.

Being in a place where everything she knew as a Seal was being rejected was not easy for Retra. Every day she was being challenged to let go of her Seal training or to stick with it. Rollo, a boy from the Grave, and Suki, a girl from the mountains, were her friends. They accepted Retra and helped her cope with the culture shock that Ixion caused. In her search for Joel, she met Charlonge, Cal, Markes, Kero and the Wings, and other gangs. These gangs have been noticing slips when it came to the Ripers, bits of harm that they tolerated or made no action to cover. Then there were the Leaguers. They were a group of youths who defy the guardianship of the Ripers and work with Ruzalia, a pirate who steals overagers from the barges to Ixion. There was tension between these groups and the Ripers that could easily turn into something dangerous. The stakes were high.

Each character had a story and I enjoyed reading about them. One of the characters that I really liked was Lenoir, the leader of the Ripers. Like Hades, he was such a sad character who was viewed negatively by most of the people in Ixion. He was powerful and yet people did not trust him. He saved Retra many times and has proved that he meant no harm to the youths. He had a soft spot for our main character, taking care and sharing a bond with her. He was different from all the other Ripers in the sense that I could feel that he truly cared for the youths who go to Ixion and that he wanted to make this place a good place for them.

The threat of the darkness was clear. Baby bats were not to stray off the paths. But in Ixion where there was no sunlight and where darkness meant comfort from the rules and the guilt of outside societies, just how much was hidden in the dark and what was the cost of freedom and pleasures?

Burn Bright is an imaginative and shocking dystopian novel that will pull in readers with its intensity and wildness. I loved the heightened danger, craziness, suspense and subtle romance. I highly recommend this to dystopian fans and paranormal romance fans! This will satisfy your cravings! I can’t wait for Angel Arias!

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