Kirit Densira admires her mother more than anyone. She has been impatiently waiting the day of her wingtest, so that she can start training with her mother to be a trader. Before her test, Kirit accidentally breaks a law, and among the Towers, Law is the utmost importance. Kirit is then given a choice: leave her home to train as a Singer, a secretive group that aids the towers, or face the consequences.

Shortly after starting UPDRAFT, I got the sneaky suspicion this would turn into a favorite, and by the end, I was so in love with the story I delayed finishing the last few chapters for several days. Fran Wilde does a seamless job of crafting a unique world of bones, songs, traditions, and flight that feels like your own before you know it. The descriptions are perfect, never too lengthy but offers the right amount of visuals to follow mentally. The layers of the world with the different Towers, floors, and creatures are stunning, and I left the story feeling like I spent an entire series in this fantasy.

One of the most surprising and refreshing elements of UPDRAFT is Kirit's character. She is never a chosen one, a savior, or even beyond extraordinarily talented. She is skilled and a fast learner, but no one is looking to her throughout the entire story to fix everything or to be a hero. She certainly has excellent traits to become a leader, but other characters do as well, creating a sense of community that other stories with bigger hero-esque figures sometimes lack. Though I love romantic relationships in stories, the focus on adventure, family, and learning made me completely forget there isn't one in here as well.

Fran Wilde is a force of talent, and I can't wait to read more from her. UPDRAFT is exciting, unique, and encompasses the reader from the very first page.

Book Summary

Welcome to a world of wind and bone, songs and silence, betrayal and courage.

Kirit Densira cannot wait to pass her wingtest and begin flying as a trader by her mother's side, being in service to her beloved home tower and exploring the skies beyond. When Kirit inadvertently breaks Tower Law, the city's secretive governing body, the Singers, demand that she become one of them instead. In an attempt to save her family from greater censure, Kirit must give up her dreams to throw herself into the dangerous training at the Spire, the tallest, most forbidding tower, deep at the heart of the City.

As she grows in knowledge and power, she starts to uncover the depths of Spire secrets. Kirit begins to doubt her world and its unassailable Laws, setting in motion a chain of events that will lead to a haunting choice, and may well change the city forever-if it isn't destroyed outright.