by Clint Hall
publisher’s synopsis
The Human Alliance knew the war was over when the machines started using magic to cast fire, shake the ground, conjure storms, and part the seas.
We fought back anyway.
22-year-old soldier Gunnar Graves lost his faith and his family when a platoon of AI-driven war machines—led by an android fire mage—destroyed his unit. Forced to live in a machine-controlled village and hiding a dark secret, he spends his days trying to learn elemental power so he can take his revenge.
After years of failure, his ability ignites when he least expects it.
On the run and hunted by the war machines, Gunnar discovers that an ancient, life-based strength has awakened to help humanity fight back. Joined by the other life mages, Gunnar is thrust into a mad world of android overlords, cyborg clans, and evil forces bent on his destruction.
To protect his newfound family, Gunnar must discover the truth behind a power he doesn’t understand and wage a war he doesn’t believe they can win.
My feelings are a little mixed on this one.
My biggest struggle was the genre–part fantasy, part sci-fi, part dystopian.
Because Steal Fire from the Gods is set in a dystopian futuristic USA, I was thrown off by the fantasy elements. While there is a storyworld reason for the magic that AI is able to perform (it’s somehow complex, precise science), it’s still treated like magic. So while my brain kept wanting to read Steal Fire as set in a possible future, it kept getting thrown off by the magic. I think it would have tripped me up less if I’d read it as an alternate-history USA, if that makes sense.
I liked Gunnar’s character. He had some perfectly timed snarky comments. Hall also did a nice job with developing the history for the current storyworld–I actually wished that there was some sort of short story or something about the Human Alliance during the AI wars.
Honestly, this is one that I feel like I need to reread before I can really decide my thoughts on it. It feels like there’s more going on in the book than I picked up on my first read-through. Maybe I read it too fast or was distracted. Either way, I plan on rereading Steal Fire from the Gods at some point, even though it didn’t wow me the first time through.
Cautions: light romance; one kiss; semi-graphic, unsettling descriptions *
*It’s been a while since I finished Steal Fire from the Gods, so I probably forgot a caution
(Steal Fire from the Gods releases in November from Enclave Publishing. I received an eARC; all thoughts and opinions are my own.)
Hailey Huntington 
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