This trilogy is Sanderson's foray into a twisted version of a superhero story. In a version of our own world, the arrival of a mysterious celestial body seems to trigger the development of superpowers in a select few people around the world. Without fail, these "Epics" become corrupt tyrants who use their powers to oppress and control as they slowly destroy the world. The Reckoners trilogy follows one group of humans as they try to uncover the weaknesses of these Epics and fight back. This second book, Firefight sees the protagonist David traveling to another city to fight an Epic with a past connection to his group's leader. Once there, he finds there's also an important connection to his own past, sure to drive a wedge into his group if anyone else learns of it.
Firefight is an interesting "middle chapter" of a trilogy, with plenty I liked and some things I didn't. It's young adult fiction, which isn't always known for nuance: in this genre, you usually expect that the "good guys" and good, the "bad guys" are bad, and that's just all there is to it. But some YA stories like to explore the gray areas, and Sanderson chooses that more rewarding option here. Book one, Steelheart, ended with a revelation that things are not as black-and-white as the protagonist, David, might have thought. And now book two, Firefight, really follows through on this idea. The course of the story drives David to really resist the good/evil dichotomy even more, stirring up new conflict that's satisfyingly born of character and not plot contrivance.
Sanderson also builds out the world he's created in interesting ways. He could probably have stretched out an exploration of strange powers and weaknesses (and their ramifications) into dozens of books. (That's certainly what other superpower franchises do.) That he did not do so means that each "Epic" character who shows up in the story has a truly important role to play. Firefight digs deeper into how this world came to be, why people get the powers they have, and why the powers drive people inexorably toward evil. And as it does all this, it shifts the story to an interesting new setting that differs from the first book.
But Firefight also goes back on one of the things I liked best about Steelheart. In my comments on that book, I mentioned that blessedly, the conventional romantic subplot that shows up in every YA book did not follow its expected course. Firefight reveals that nope, we're actually going to do exactly the romantic subplot these stories always have. In particular, I didn't enjoy how much the main character was motivated by love -- particularly when it's portrayed in an (accurate) teenage way that might as easily be infatuation, lust, or something else. Even with a character in the story who openly mocks the idea of "love being the answer," I felt the story wasn't doing enough to depart from the trope. I guess Sanderson felt like he could only thwart so many conventions of the genre.
Still, Firefight offered a few nice surprises along the way, even if I sensed the gist of where it would end. The journey was rewarding, even if -- like the young sick child of The Princess Bride -- I would have preferred to skip all the "kissy stuff." I give Firefight a B+. I'll be curious to get to the final book of the series and see how Sanderson brings it all home.
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