The Fifth Season was a thriller of a read and reminded me as to why I love fantasy books so much and how much I have missed falling into an alternate universe. The book starts off a little slow as I struggled to follow the storylines of the three main protagonists Damaya, Syenite and Essun in the beginning. The book switches back and forth between their perspectives which can be a little confusing as I struggled to follow their different narratives and events. However, as the book continues to build and the plot unravels, the structure of the novel and style makes much more sense. If you can stick with the first 50 pages, this book is well worth the read.

I think the first point to touch on with fantasy is always the world-building. In The Fifth Season the premise is that there are a group of people called Orogenes, who are able to perform Orogeny (the ability to manipulate thermal, kinetic and related forms of energy - i.e. they can move the ground when the world has an Earthquake and much more). The Orogenes are controlled by the Fulcrum (a paramilitary organisation) and they all have Guardians as they are seen as dangerous. Damaya, Syenite and Essun are all Orogenes. The book focuses on their experience as Orogenes (outcasts of society) and we see how their abilities develop in line with their character arcs. I really liked the concept of Orogeny and it reminded me a lot of Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy, with the concepts of controlling elements and power. I did find Jemisin's descriptions and concepts a little confusing at times, and I think a general understanding of discourse surrounding earthquakes, seismic activity and geology is helpful. Thankfully, I read this book on my kindle so I could just highlight any words I wasn't familiar with to get a google definition which really helped.

Alongside the concept of Orogeny, society is broken up into various comms (communities of people) who are all trying to make it through a season. From what I gather, the seasons (it wasn't clear how long a season is) appear to be ended by some volcanic eruption or earthquake that wipes out large amounts of civilization. There were some really interesting points in this book about how people interacted with nature and the Earth that resonated with me today. Given our current climate predicament and the emergency we are facing, this novel felt very relevant.

"Then people began to do horrible things to Father Earth. They poisoned waters beyond even his ability to cleanse, and killed much of the other life that lived on his surface. They drilled through the crust of his skin, past the blood of his mantle, to get at the sweet marrow of his bones. And at the height of human hubris and might, it was the orogenes who did something that even Earth could not forgive. They destroyed his only child."

In terms of the characters, there were not a tonne of secondary characters as the main focus was on the three protagonists who were all really strong females. I really enjoyed seeing how Damaya, Syenite and Essun developed over the book and I think Jemisin invested a lot in their character development. There were three secondary characters that stood out to be Alabastar, Hoa and Tonkee. These guys were interesting, a little mysterious and also a little bit scary and I think that added to the edge of the narrative. We learned just enough about them as secondary characters to make them relevant and interesting, but the book left many unanswered questions that will hopefully be explored in the second instalment. I don't think the lack of secondary characters was a detriment to this book though, and whilst other fantasy series benefit from a plethora of secondary characters, this book felt strengthened by the much narrower focus.

The "villains" in this book are the guardians, who are there to watch over the orogenes and they are just a little bit psychopathic. They seem all nice and friendly with their pretty faces and lovely words, but then they watch over their charges, they can track them wherever, and they are there to keep them in order. Worst of all, they have unknown political aims and unknown intentions. I feel like the guardians were incredibly elusive throughout the whole novel but whenever they showed up they were terrifyingly scary and super over-powered. I hope we get to learn more about the guardians and their aims in the next book.

"But the greatest danger lies in what you are, Dama. You can no more hide that than you can the fact that you are female, or your clever young mind." She blushes, unsure if this is praise. He smiles so she knows it is. He continues: "Every time the earth moves, you will hear its call. In every moment of danger you will reach, instinctively, for the nearest source of warmth and movement. The ability to do this is, to you, as fists are to a strong man. When a threat is imminent, of course you'll do what you must to protect yourself. And when you do, people will die."

Overall, I really enjoyed reading The Fifth Season and it reminded me how much I've missed reading fantasy books like this. Hopefully I'll be able to read the next one soon, although I told myself I was not allowed to buy any new books for a while… So that may have to be broken.