Review: Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston

Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via Edelweiss+ in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be released on February 27th.  If you like YA, Sci-Fi, pirates in space, and a little bit of romance I'd go check this out.

This is an interesting take on the typical YA Sci-Fi. I enjoyed it. It had decent romance, but it wasn't overbearing, which sometimes can be the case in YA. It has good action, and strong female characters. It also has good LGBTQA+ rep. There is even a human and AI romance.

This isn't sold to us as an Anastasia retelling, but it has that vibe. Long lost princess is found after she is thought to have been dead for many years. I like that she's been raised by pirates and she's strong, rough around the edges, and a thief. She is everything the future empress should not be, and when her heritage is uncovered, she doesn't embrace the gentle lifestyle of the royals. She continues to be the space pirate she was raised as. Joining Ana on her hijinx is her best friend and faithful companion D09 aka Di. Di is an AI or a metal, who was created to help heal humans during a great plague. Something went wrong with the metals and there was an uprising causing Ana's family to be killed and Ana to be lost in the first place. Di has been with Ana as her friend and protector since her escape from the metal uprising, but neither remembers what happened. Ana and Di are on a mission to find the Tsarina, the long lost ship that holds answers to Ana's past and parts to fix Di's glitching memory core. They run into Robb, a noble, who is kind of an outcast in his family who is also looking for the Tsarina to find out what happened to his father. Robb ends up travelling with Ana and Di to find the ship. We also follow the perspective of Jax, pilot of the Dossier, the ship Ana has grown up on. Jax is an interesting character, but I won't spoil him here. As the four main characters try to uncover what really happened with the metal revolt, the truth of Ana's past, and avoid current plots against them much is revealed and they all are tested. Friends are lost, love is found, enemies are confronted, and an empress must decide to run and hide or fight for her kingdom.

The pace started out a bit slow for me, but it does pick up towards the end. I think part of that was the switching between perspectives. We follow Ana, D09/Di, Robb, Jax, and toward the end a 5th perspective. I'm not a fan of multi-perspective books in general. I can do two, but any more than two and I have a hard time engaging. That is a personal preference not a problem with the writing or the plot. I do think the whole Ironblood thing could have been explained better. It is the defining trait of the rich and the poor, but how people came to have iron in their blood is never really explained and it really doesn't give anyone any special powers just privilege.

Overall, I did enjoy the story and I look forward to the next installment. I enjoyed the originality Ashley Poston brought to the storyline.

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