If ever there was a book to emphasize that I read what I like, Fire & Heist is it. The story of a teenage wyvern and her family of thieves tickled me more than it should have. The target audience is a good thirty years younger than I am, but that did not stop me from devouring it. I adore with Sky and acknowledged privilege. More importantly, I fell in love with the unexpected pleasure of Sky’s unlikely crew. Not only is their banter hilarious, but I also love how each of them embraces their quirks, the best of whom is Gabriella, Sky’s human friend. She is not familiar with the world of wyverns, and her enthusiasm has no bounds. She is also an unashamed geek, and you cannot help but fall in love with her implacability in the face of Sky’s imperiousness but her lack of filter and childlike wonder when it comes to magic and unicorns. We all need a friend as honest and as supportive as Gabriella.
The story itself is goofy. Dragons live on earth and are among the richest people on the planet because they hoard gold. Dragons obtain gold hoards by stealing from other dragons. Dragon society rewards those dragon families with the most gold and punishes those who are not successful burglars. Add in a home dragon land, a missing parent, unrequited love, more than one failed heist, a mysterious jewel, and power-hungry dragons and you have a story that is one part Romeo and Juliet, one part Ocean’s Eleven, one part geek fantasy, and one part Hallmark movie. It is cheesy goodness at its best.
I love the fact that I can still enjoy novels meant for a younger crowd and never want this trait to change. Some people might say that life is too short to read bad books, but I say life is too short not to have fun and enjoy any book that interests you. In the case of Fire & Heist, the dragons caught my interest, the similarities to Ocean’s Eleven kept my attention, and characters like Gabriella made me fall in love with this story of gold-stealing were-dragons.
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