Review by Joshua Forbes
August 30th, 2024
These posts are just our opinions of the books we read, and don't yet reflect the decision of our judging team or the progression of the book in the SFINCS competition.
Summary:
Firefighter Edward Stoneman, referred to as “Dodge” by those who know him, has a special gift, but can’t quite find a purpose for it. On his fiftieth birthday, thoughts of retirement frighten him. He finds solace in his cat, until he has a certain recurring dream: a young boy in the middle of a fire, but unburnt.
When Dodge finds himself first to arrive at the scene of a house fire, it’s already too late. With seemingly nothing left to save, something beyond Dodge’s perception tells him he needs to go in, and a close call leads to him saving a four year old girl. After lying to his superiors about his superhero-esque antics, he notices two things about the girl.
She shows no signs of injury, and she looks remarkably similar to one of Dodge’s old flames.
Without giving too much more away, the story sends Dodge spiraling into who this girl really is, what good he can do with his own powers, and who the boy is standing in the fire, unburnt.
The Good:
Undeniably the best thing about the story is the premise and the professionalism that comes with it. The entire time reading I believed that the author 100% knew what she was talking about, which is hard to say with a lot of sci-fi stories. The feelings Dodge expressed had me believing a 50 year old fireman actually drafted the novella.
Very appreciated was how the word choices rarely grew dull, and the way characters' expressions were described painted clear pictures. I was also hard-pressed to find a typo during my time with the story.
A surprising element that I ended up really enjoying was the slow development of Dodge’s relationship with Bea, a girl he sees for hookups at the bar he works for part time. Their interactions become less about the sex and more about each other, and there’s a visible shift in how Dodge feels about her.
After the couple chapters dedicated to character introductions, I was greeted by a well-constructed action scene. Dodge was pitted against an unsurvivable house fire. One that would be unbearable to anyone but him. I enjoyed every second of it, and it quite literally quenched my fears that pitting man versus fire alone would lead to low stakes action.
The Bad:
Coming off of the first phenomenal action scene of the story, I was anticipating more high stakes encounters. There are more sprinkled throughout the story, but they are only begun, then skipped over. I found myself wishing the novella had been just a little bit longer so I could get a bigger taste of those scenes, since what is there truly is good.
Another example of me wanting more was after a brief interaction between Dodge and the girl he saved. An interaction hinting at a very dark past for her, but isn’t given much thought after that. I wanted to see more of Dodge and this girl bonding over their shared gift, but the allotted time and nature of the story forces her out of the equation for many scenes.
A smaller issue, more of a personal gripe if we’re being honest, was the amount of vulgarity outside of dialogue. There reached a point where I felt the need to start tallying the number of F-bombs. I counted 45 for anyone wondering. It’s not enough to bring down the story, but I was pulled out of a scene or two.
Overall:
Unburnt is a unique merge of an unconventional superhero story, and a well written firefighter novel.
Most of my criticisms for the novella came from me simply wanting more, which I suppose is itself a compliment. I chose to read this one first because the premise was enough to hook me in, and I urge anyone else who finds that premise interesting to give Unburnt a chance.
Three and a half stars out of five.
Be sure to tune in to our Twitter/X @ZachForbesBro for new blog posts about the novellas we read for the SFINCS competition! And click through to our website if you want to see other projects my brother and I have been working on!
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