Vuur

The Elements #3

by John Boyne, Anke Frerichs (Translator)

Na Water en Aarde is Vuur het derde boek in het vierluik De elementen, waarin Boyne intrigerende vragen stelt over medeplichtigheid, moed, veerkracht en schuld

Een ijzingwekkende roman over een vrouw die balanceert op de grens tussen slachtoffer- en daderschap. Of heeft ze die lijn al overschreden?

Op het eerste gezicht heeft Freya een heerlijk leven en doet ze uitsluitend waar ze zin in heeft. Ze is rijk en geprivilegieerd, ze heeft een verantwoordelijke baan als chirurg gespecialiseerd in huidtransplantaties, woont in een prachtige flat in een gewilde buurt en rijdt in een luxe auto. Maar ooit was dat allemaal heel anders. Haar leven is gebaseerd op duisternis. Heeft wat Freya als kind tijdens een noodlottige zomer overkwam invloed gehad op de volwassene die ze zou worden – of was ze voorbestemd om die persoon te zijn, met andere is ze geboren met wreedheid in haar hart?

In Vuur neemt John Boyne de lezer mee op een huiveringwekkende, ongemakkelijke, maar uiterst meeslepende psychologische reis naar het epicentrum van de menselijke geest, waarbij hij de eeuwenoude vraag opvoeding of aanleg?

In de pers

‘Goed nieuws dat Lucht, Aarde en Vuur nog in het verschiet liggen.’ Trouw over Water

‘Willow heeft een prettige vertelstem, die net zo overtuigend is als haar omgang met de (soms) nieuwsgierige dorpelingen. Aardige, kleurrijke types zijn het, die voorkomen dat het geheel loodzwaar wordt.’ Het Parool over Water

‘Een krachtig portret van een jongeman met gebreken.’ Daily Mail over Aarde

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Ireland, Irish Literature, Audiobook, Novella

192 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 11, 2024

About the author

I was born in Dublin, Ireland, and studied English Literature at Trinity College, Dublin, and Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia, Norwich. In 2015, I was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters by UEA.

I’ve published 14 novels for adults, 6 novels for younger readers, and a short story collection. The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas was a New York Times no.1 Bestseller and was adapted for a feature film, a play, a ballet and an opera, selling around 11 million copies worldwide.

Among my most popular books are The Heart’s Invisible Furies, A Ladder to the Sky and My Brother’s Name is Jessica.

I’m also a regular book reviewer for The Irish Times.

In 2012, I was awarded the Hennessy Literary ‘Hall of Fame’ Award for my body of work. I’ve also won 4 Irish Book Awards, and many international literary awards, including the Que Leer Award for Novel of the Year in Spain and the Gustav Heinemann Peace Prize in Germany. In 2015, I was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of East Anglia.

My novels are published in 58 languages.

My 14th adult novel, ALL THE BROKEN PLACES, a sequel and companion novel to THE BOY IN THE STRIPED PYJAMAS, will be published in the UK on September 15th 2022, in the US and Canada on November 29th, and in many foreign language editions in late 2022 and 2023.

Reviews

[Emily May · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely the most fucked up of the Elements quartet so far. Not sure what it says about me that this is my favourite.

Boyne used Water and Earth to explore themes of culpability and complicity. In both books, we are introduced to characters that sit close to horrific crimes and, in some ways, aid them or allow them to happen. The characters are victims in some ways, guilty in others, but Boyne simply draws a complex portrait of their lives, leaving the reader to pass judgement.

In Fire, however, Freya is very much guilty. And possibly Boyne's most messed up character to date.

This is the kind of book that makes me long for a book club. It's one that would benefit more from a discussion rather than a review; I could do with some back and forth to help me organise my thoughts.

It is obvious that Boyne is interested in exploring stories where people are both perpetrators and victims, showing that not only is it possible for someone to be both, but for their to be many shades of grey in between.

Freya is someone who has lived through trauma and is now repaying that trauma back onto the world, hurting others in a desperate bid to pay back what happened to her. Boyne is one of very few authors who can make you feel, at the same time, completely disgusted by and sympathetic towards a character.

So much of this was horrible to read, yet I couldn't stop.

Please note this contains depictions of child sexual assault.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

My first read of 2025 and it’s by a favorite author of mine.
The third novella in Boyne’s element quartet…
I can’t say much about it without giving too much away.
So I will just say that the story is about Freya.. a renowned surgeon who treats burn victims.
Her background of being neglected and abuse by a couple of friends as a child, has left her extremely damaged and in her mind it justifies the harm she does to others as an adult.
You will feel bad for what was done to her as a child… but horrified at what she does as an adult… it can be an uncomfortable read.
Boyne packs so much into few pages.

[Mark Porton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fire the third book in the Water, Earth, Fire, Air tetralogy by John Boyne is another masterpiece. As with the other books in this series they are loosely linked. Creating a whole, without it really feeling like it. It’s very well done.

Burns surgeon Freya is a wealthy, beautiful, thirty-something woman, working in a UK Burns Unit. Many of the cases she deals with are horrific. A considerable number are due to domestic violence, usually men – torching their ex-loved ones. We’ve had two cases of this in Australia recently. What is wrong with us?

It is clear Freya marches to a different beat, she cares little about how she is perceived by others, and there is something unusual, dark, about what makes her tick. We do go back to her childhood to learn of some events that obviously helped shaped this woman.

There is a very dark thread running through this story.

Freya’s interactions with colleagues, patients and visitors paints a picture of our protagonist. There is an uncomfortable foreboding feel about each chapter – Boyne had me in the palm of his hand.

5 Stars

My review of Water: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
My review of Earth: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Angela M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m was left stunned when I finished . This is the most disturbing and dark for me of The Elements series and was the most difficult to read . I will say what I’ve said before about John Boyne . He’s a brilliant writer who can put you in the head and heart of his characters, even those that you’d rather not feel so close to. With the first two books , I had ambivalent feelings about the main characters. They were flawed , made mistakes, but there was something about them that made me angry and sympathetic at the same time. By giving us the awful back story of Dr. Freya Petrus’ childhood, we’re forced to think about whether this made her the monster she turned out to be as an adult. I couldn’t get past what she did to innocent victims and the impact that it had on them. The vileness of it outweighed my sympathy, made me sick to my stomach. In spite of how uncomfortable and chilling this novella is, I have to continue to give credit to Boyne’s ability to weave a story and connect you with another perspective.

The fire symbolism is front and center as Freya is a doctor who treats burn victims and we later learn how much she knows about fire. The links between the stories through characters who overlap is another illustration of Boyne’s amazing storytelling capabilities. Be forewarned, this is a disturbing gut puncher that had me waking up thinking about the victims . It as brilliant as it is brutal. Next up is Air.

This is the third novella in the series The Elements which I received as an arc that is part of the collection of the books to be published September, 2025 received from Holt through Edelweiss.

[PattyMacDotComma · Rating 5 out of 5]

5★
“…from the moment we arrive on the planet the universe is against us, conspiring to drown us, set us on fire, bury us in the earth, our spirits floating off into the atmosphere.”

I’m convinced John Boyne can write anything from anyone’s point of view. Here he has thirty-six-year-old Dr Freya Petrus, an acclaimed burns specialist, narrate her tale of revenge, and what a vengeful woman she is… with good reason. The book opens with:

“When I was twelve years old, I was buried alive within the grounds of a construction site.”

This is the FIRE part of Boyne’s ELEMENTS QUARTET which begins with WATER and EARTH. So far, (in my words), not only are the elements conspiring against us, we have used them to drown our sorrows, bury our past, and burn our bridges to bad memories. AIR is still to come.

The books are loosely connected, so reading them out of order would give some spoilers to the previous books, although each story is self-contained.

Freya narrates her story in the first person, as if she’s addressing us, the reader. Her tone seems to shift between showing off her cleverness and explaining why she has been driven to do what she does – regularly – to make up for the damage done during the summer she was twelve.

She lived with her grandmother, Hannah, because her mother, Beth, couldn’t cope so moved away to share her life and bed with a series of short-term boyfriends.

“Hannah was only thirty-two when I was born and thirty-three when my mother, Beth, moved to Cornwall, leaving me in her care.
. . .
Both had become pregnant when they were teenagers and, thinking this was the natural order of things, I assumed that I would be a mother myself at sixteen, but, thankfully, I knew better than to bring a child into this world.”

She sure did know better. She was sent to Cornwall every summer to spend two months with her mother, but the only people who were interested in her were the fourteen-year-old twin boys who lived in the rather grand house nearby. Mum had her own life.

“ Instead of feeling welcome in her home or being over-compensated for her lack of maternal affection across the other ten months of the year, I always went to bed on my first night aware that she was counting down the days until I could be despatched back to Norfolk.”

As for finding out about her father, grandmother Hannah had told her all that she knew.

“That he was a lad from the year above Beth in school, a wrong ’un from a family of tinkers who were no better than they ought to be, and he’d just shrugged his shoulders when Beth told him that he’d got her up the spout, saying it was nothing to do with him if she was the town bike and how did she know it was his anyway? Half the school first eleven had had her.

‘Which they hadn’t,’ she insisted. ‘Not half, anyway.’”

Freya was always smart and is known as a good, thorough doctor, but a bit cold and hard. She is admired but not liked. In a conversation with her medical student, whom she was surprised had chosen to work with her in spite of her difficult reputation, they are discussing why she chose burns as a specialty.

“ ‘The elements destroy everything. Think of water. When someone drowns, and their body floats back to shore, their features are so bloated it can be difficult to identify them. Think of earth. When a body is buried, it starts to decompose immediately. Think of air. If we’re deprived of it for even a few minutes, we die. Then think of fire. When someone’s physical appearance is damaged by burns, we turn away, repulsed. We don’t want to know.’”

She’s mysterious and dangerous with a fascinating compulsion.

Boyne writes from the perspective of both perpetrators and victims (often the same person at different times of their life). There are reasons people become perpetrators and reasons they select the victims they do. The public has a tendency to choose sides quickly when crimes are committed, and I like seeing Boyne shake that up.

I always love his writing, and I particularly I like the connections between these short books. They have all been dark, exposing people’s vulnerabilities as they do, but they are insightful and thought-provoking. Could I have done some of these things?

I remember a primary school principal telling me that parents insist “MY child would NEVER do or say such a thing”.

She would reply that “ANY child, given the right set of circumstances, will do or say almost anything.” (I may have added the “almost”.)

It’s more of a thriller than I expected, but it makes perfect sense. He is showing us those “circumstances” and what keeps happening in every generation because we haven’t managed to create better “circumstances”.

Thanks to NetGalley and Transworld/Doubleday for the copy for review from which I’ve quoted. This will be out in a few weeks and is still available on NetGalley.

[enzoreads · Rating 5 out of 5]

WTF je l’ai fini d’une seule traite c’est complètement whatttt j’ai besoin d’un book club pour en parler je suis complètement disturbed omg wtf wt whattt quoii mais QUOIIIIII WHATTTT du génie omg wMais EWWW WHATTT

[Meike · Rating 5 out of 5]

Part three of the "Elements" quartet, and while Boyne is successful throughout when it comes to delivering surprising twists and turns while slowly revealing the narrators' backstories and the nature of their guilt, this one is the real shocker - and the first installment that really delivers on the water-earth-fire-air metaphors. All parts deal with sexual abuse, and our narrator in "Fire" is the jury foreperson of the rape trial in Earth, Freya. She is a doctor in a burn unit, but struggles with human relationships, which shows when she interacts with a young doctor assigned to her, a guy who will become more important to her than she initially anticipates. Bit by bit, we learn that Freya, the unwanted child of a teenage mother hailing from a poor, dysfunctional family, struggles with severe childhood trauma, and she has since been on a mission to avenge what happened to her...

In the last installment, the narrator was a gay soccer player haunted by trauma and abuse, now we get a heterosexual female doctor who goes down another path to deal with her horrific past. Both of these characters seek love, and the denial of love has deformed them - which makes me wonder how one John Boyne, a man who finds such psychologically plausible and insightful things to say about the havoc of abuse and its ruinous effects, can identify as a trans-exclusionary radical feminist. This ideology does nothing but project the very real trauma of people who have been harmed by men on the trans community, as if trans women were abusive men in drag. I believe that the trauma of people like J.K. Rowling and Andrea Dworkin is/was very real, but they are harming a minority who is not at fault for what was done to them by cis men. "Fire" shows the same dynamic, and Boyne clearly doesn't condone it in his fiction - doesn't he realize the sinister irony?

This is an excellently constructed and paced, shocking and impactful pageturner about the cycle of abuse, and I see the quartet coming together as an overall daring and smart project - apparently, the art is smarter than its creator.

[Kaya · Rating 1 out of 5]

Fundamentally unconvincing female voice that pretty much ruined this book. Utterly unconvincing depiction of a traumatised psyche. Some might argue that that was purposeful because of the MC’s twisted ego/sociopathic nature, etc - it did not read that way to me and was very jarring from the first page. Heavy-handed and contrived. An implausible storyline. Trying to do too much (e.g. attempts at making reader question their preconceptions re sexual violence and paedophilia, attempts at commentary on dynamics between sexes and/or moral quandaries re perpetrator/victimhood) with zero sophistication. Ended with unnecessary twist that was not foreshadowed properly. On-the-nose references to “elements” to fit the theme of this quartet. Shallow characterisation of basically everyone who appeared. Unrealistic depiction of the job of a doctor/surgeon. Unrealistic dialogue between men and women; unconvincing depictions of teenage males and their use of language. Was a tense book and a page-turner through its (cheap) use of some foreshadowing and flashback scenes - but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t bad. If it wanted to address the themes it did, it was not (and arguably could not be) done well in this novella format. There was no nuance - ironic given that this book (according to the blurb) had the lofty ambition of making the reader think about the (very broad) debate of “nature v. nurture”. I have not said this ever about a book because am heavy supporter of artistic licence but it read as though it was using the dark, complex themes and shocking events to do nothing more than disturb and horrify - simply put, its gratuitous repulsiveness was (dare I say) borderline offensive to those who have suffered sexual assault/trauma. Can confidently say this was poorly conceived and executed. Should have stayed much longer in Boyne’s drafts.

[Stephen the Bookworm · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the third book in John Boyne's Elements Quartet and following on from the previous two this packs a huge powerful punch.

This is a one sit reading. It can't be anything else as you are pulled into the world of Freya. As a child , she was the victim of horrendous acts but as an adult her retribution is dark to say the least.

Freya works on the burns unit at a hospital helping to save lives and ideally give back some hope to victims . She is supported by her secretary Louise and new intern Aaron who she tolerates. But beyond the confines of the hospital and saving lives Freya leads a darker life - a sinister existence!

John Boyne pushes the boundaries of societal expectations with regards to horrific personal tragedies and punishments and challenges our thinking - sometime manipulating our thoughts in the most difficult ways - twisting our sense of victim and perpetrator.

It is difficult to write about the plot as to do so would add spoilers. There are threads that link the previous novels Earth and Water to Fire. This - like the previous books- opens up debate, darkens our thoughts and horrifies more than the other novels- you will need to find a friend who has read this book and the others to unwind your responses; express your emotions; reflect upon the world we live in.

John Boyne is a master storyteller and in all his work digs deep in to the human's darker recesses.- pushing taboos.

This is a story about the perpetrator but also about the long term damage to victims

This is a book that will linger long after reading- it will cause debate but most certainly draw more attention to something none of us want to or do consider and possibly give a light of hope to the victims of such crimes that they won't be forgotten

As for stars --- it is difficult- Five stars for a master storyteller.... but in relation to giving stars to the plot , the content and the impact then that in itself is a challenge. I'm sure many others will find this a dilemma!

Quotes:

The elements destroy everything. Think of water. When someone drowns, and their body floats back to shore, their features are so bloated it can be difficult to identify them. Think of earth. When a body is buried, it starts to decompose immediately. Think of air. If we’re deprived of it for even a few minutes, we die. Then think of fire. When someone’s physical appearance is damaged by burns, we turn away, repulsed. We don’t want to know.’

Can a person be blamed for how they were born? No, probably not. But it’s neither here nor there, is it? It’s the committing of the act that matters.

[Andrew Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

The third in a series of novellas titled after and featuring the four elements of matter. There’s a thread that runs through them, linking them together, but each carries a story of its own. In this instalment, we are introduced to Freya, a surgeon specialising in skin grafts. She lives a solitary life, refusing to develop close relationships either at work or beyond. But gradually, we are to learn that her behaviour, in fact her whole outlook on life, might stem back to an episode in her past. Either way, it becomes clear that Freya is a very scary character.

So is she who she is as a result of a gratuitous act perpetrated upon her? Or perhaps she who she is because she’s inherited genes from a selfish, uncaring mother and an unknown father who abandoned her before she was even born? It’s a question for the ages. What I do know is that this tale is one that I read in a single sitting: I couldn’t put it down, I couldn’t believe what I was reading. To me, it’s the finest offering in what is an excellent series of stories.

My thanks to Random House UK for supplying a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Kate O'Shea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just when you think it can't get any darker than Earth and Water, John Boyne gives us Fire. My jaw dropped open quite early on and didn't close until the end.

Fire is the story of Freya, a surgeon with a great reputation. She is beautiful, wealthy and seems to have everything anyone would desire. However, her past is what drives her private life, which is not at all what you'd expect. The question is, will what happened to her as a child mean she can never live a normal life.

I certainly didn't expect any of what happened in this book. Boyne takes the shocks to a new level and I was completely blindsided by the end.

Loved it. Highly recommended. You don't need to read the first two to enjoy this but why wouldn't you - they were excellent too - and there are parts of Fire that hark back to both Earth and Water. I'm really looking forward to Air.

Thankyou very much to Penguin Random House for the advance review copy. Very much appreciated.

[Antoinette · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fire is the third book in the Elements series by John Boyne. All three have dealt with sexual abuse. All three were disturbing and hard hitting, but I will say this one especially left me reeling.

Freya Petrus is 36 years old and is a surgeon working on a burn unit doing skin grafts. She is empathetic to her patients, difficult to work with and a loner. She likes to keep her private life private and is not looking to make friends at work.Slowly we learn of her traumatic past. Is she the woman she is today because of her past or would she always have turned out as she has done?

This book is a mere 166 pages- to say more would be to reveal too much. John Boyne has taken me on a journey since I started Water, where I met a woman who may have turned a blind eye to Earth, where a young man becomes a willing accomplice to Fire, where we meet evil face to face. Where will he take me in the final book- Air?

I’ve said this with every book of his I have read- he is an amazing writer, who has introduced me to characters, both sympathetic and abhorrent but from who I could not turn away.

Published: 2024

[Debbie · Rating 5 out of 5]

“When I was twelve years old, I was buried alive within the grounds of a construction site.”

That is the opening line of this brilliant, creepy novella by John Boyne, who continues to seal the deal as a favorite author. Fire is the third book in The Elements series, which consists of four loosely related novellas. I’m still on my pogo stick after reading the first two! Getting physically tired, but who the hell cares! I’m jazzed, with wind in my face!

Okay, how about that opener, anyway? I dare you not to continue reading after you gobble up that line! Freya is a successful surgeon in a burn unit. She has it all. She’s accomplished, respected, rich, attractive. What she isn’t is mentally healthy. (Ha, now that’s an understatement if I ever heard one!)

You learn this gradually, and the tension builds as you read. Yep, she’s creepy alright, holy guacamole! Man has Boyne created a doozy of a woman! Freya is very much a loner. This is not the person you want to be pals with, though actually, she hides her secret life well so you’d never know what she’s really up to. I’m not going to say much else other than you of course find out why she was buried alive and how it affected her. Ha, this last sentence for sure plays down the ride you’re in for.

There are twists and turns; this is an edge-of-your-seater. Can’t believe how Boyne ratchets up the suspense. You never know where the story is going, my favorite kind of read. It’s a psychological thriller of the literary-fiction kind, which veers from the pure literary fiction I associate with Boyne. But I must say that he has deep psychological insight with everything he writes.

When I first see what Freya is up to, I’m upset. I want a protagonist I can root for, and Boyne usually gives me that. Well, not so here! It’s impossible to like Freya but she is off-the-charts fascinating. Sure, I felt sorry that she endured the trauma she did as a kid, but I couldn’t stand what she became. She’s a character who will stick with me, whether I want her creepiness to follow me around or not!

This is a very disturbing book, so be warned. But as I was devouring this gem, getting totally absorbed, and fretting bigtime, I was able to step back and just admire the hell out of Boyne. This is my favorite book in the series so far. It’s a wild one!

Next stop: Air, the last novella in the series. Hot diggity! Steering my pogo stick over to the book right now!

[NILTON TEIXEIRA · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Fire”, (The Elements #3), by John Boyne

5 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

TW: physical and emotional abuse, sexual abuse, pedophilia

This one is the darkest story that I’ve read by this author.

That conclusion was brutal!

I’m kind of speechless, so I need a time to gather my thoughts.

But I can affirm one more time that this author is a very talented writer.

I may revisit this review later on.

Hardcover: 176 pages

[Dave Marsland · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is something utterly compelling about Fire, the third book of The Elements. John Boyne is a masterful plate spinner. Beautiful prose and brave writing. But it's very dark, a very dark fire. Horrifically brilliant.

[Patience ~ AnotherOddCreature シ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finished on my birthday!!!! Yayyy me 🥳

4✨ But, but John Boyne 😦😦 this story is soooo unsettling 😖! Well written still! On to the next one, “Air”.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

I haven’t read any of the other books in Boyne’s ‘Elements’ series, but I’d seen several comparisons between this and Alissa Nutting’s Tampa, so I had to check it out. The comparison is understandable, since both books centre on a female predator. But while Boyne’s writing is assured, Fire lacks the wit, irreverence and boldness Tampa has in spades. Freya is a beautiful, successful surgeon in her thirties who has a disturbing secret life. A second part of the narrative discloses a traumatic incident from her childhood, and Fire purports (if you believe the blurb) to ask: ‘Did what happened to Freya as a child one fateful summer influence the adult she would become – or was she always destined to be that person?’ I’m not sure it really answers that, although maybe it’s meant to be a jumping-off point for discussions rather than an examination of trauma in and of itself.

I found this competently written and a brisk, tense read, though I don’t know that I got much out of it or thought it was doing much of anything really. It’s very short – more novella than novel – and the character development is the kind of sketch you get in a short story: it’s efficient but there’s little room for it to breathe. Maybe it’s more effective in the context of the others in this series, and I found Fire interesting enough that I’d still consider reading them.

[zed · Rating 4 out of 5]

The third in the author’s Elements series explores nurture or nature and is told in the first person by a lady called Freya. Such as the previous two books, this is again a powerful tale and as before I read no blurb. These are better books for that, as they tend to have left me confronting situations that I had never considered. It is hard not to review without giving away the premise, so from here on we get spoilers

Freya a burn’s specialist at a hospital basically psychologically exploits young boys for sex as conscious revenge for an event where as a 12-year-old she was raped and buried by 14-year-old twins. She seems psychologically damaged by the age group, as this seems to be where boys can be cruel for the sake of it. Fire becomes both her profession and was her weapon. Are her actions nurture or nature. As this is told in the first person, we, the reader/listener, are asked to consider this.


As with the first two books in the series, this was a very challenging book. These are not for the faint-hearted.

[Linda]

I found Fire, the third installment of John Boyne's Element Quartet, difficult to process. The novella focuses on Freya, a beautiful, successful burn unit surgeon who reminds me of a character from a Hitchcock film. She has suffered gross abuse and neglect as a child, and as an adult, she becomes a sick, sociopathic serial sexual abuser. Boyne provides an in-depth depiction of her modus operandi for grooming and raping 14-year-old boys that is deeply disturbing. Her cruelty, which bordered on sadism, made me wonder if her behavior was a function of her own abuse, coupled with something within her.

I can't say I enjoyed this novella. However, it effectively demonstrates the impact of extreme abuse on its victims.

[Hamad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Water ★★★★
Earth ★★★★
Fire ★★★★★

One of the most fucked up books I read, and I loved it!!
I am going to be honest; it took me some to realize there is an ongoing theme with the series. Boyne does not shy away from heavy topics in his books and with this series he chose to write about "bad" characters. I wanted to say morally gray, but I don't believe they can be described this way.

Freya, the protagonist in this book is so well written because as fucked as she is, I still cared about her; I understood her as a victim, but it does not justify her current actions. This book gave me so much mixed emotions!!

The books are loosely connected, and we even get some answers for events in the last book which were left open as I mentioned in my review. The twists were expected but this does not make their impact any less powerful. I loved how the book started and even more how it ended, and I cannot wait to read Aaron's story in the finale.

[Dianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This Elemental series of novellas by John Boyne are so disheartening and disturbing, but his writing and story-telling are impeccable, as always. Impossible to put down, with memorable characters and harrowing but deeply human dilemmas that will stay with you.

The books are all lightly tied together, so I recommend reading them in order if you can. Water, Earth, Fire, Water (coming out spring 2025).

One of my very favorite authors.

[NZLisaM · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Elements series by John Boyne is a collection of four novellas – Water, Earth, Fire, and Air (Release Date: 1st May 2025) – each representing the four elements found in nature. Fire is #3.

Dr Freya Petrus is a thirty-six-year-old gifted, renowned surgeon specialising in burn victims. She saves lives on a daily basis. But Freya is plagued by the traumatic abuse she suffered the summer she was twelve years old. This is Freya’s story.

I mentioned Earth being dark, but Fire was even more depraved and distressing. Right from the first deeply disturbing line though I couldn’t put it down. I had to know what happened next and how it ended. This was my favourite instalment of the series as it was the only one I would label a psychological thriller. The twists were mind-blowing. Also, the way it connected to Water and Earth … I’m still reeling!

Just as Evan was introduced in Water, Freya had a small role in Earth. This book doesn’t specify how much time has passed between the previous book and this one, but I estimate three to five years. The only thing that did surprise me is that this character had no connection to the island like Willow and Evan did. Just like the first two books, there was the current timeline, and the past one, in this case, to that fateful summer. In this instalment all the elements were inserted into the writing in subtle, skilful ways.

Be advised that the content warnings listed in spoiler tags below contain major spoilers for this novella, and the series overall. I only include them because the crimes perpetrated in this book will be very triggering for some readers.

Trigger Warnings: Child Abuse – physical, sexual, emotional, neglect. Child rape, Child torture, Child Killer, Bullying, Abduction and Paedophilia, Grooming, Suicide, Spousal abuse, Incest, Victims with severe burns.

[Claire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fire is easily the most confronting of Boyne’s Elements series but perhaps also the best. Trigger warnings for absolutely everything, if you’re not sure if this is for you, it’s probably not. Where Water and Earth have explored culpability and complicity in relation to crime and assault, Fire considers whether perpetrators or assault are born or made. It’s extremely dark, and it kept going places (further) than I expected. But it’s spectacularly well done. I’m actually obsessed with this series. I find Boyne such a hit or miss writer, but I find what he’s doing here both daring, in how confronting and direct it is, and clever in the tight interweaving of these stories, and concise way that these stories are constructed.

[♥ Sandi ❣ · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars

When I first downloaded these four novellas, Water, Earth, Fire and Air they had not come out in a completed book format - they were all separate novellas. At that time Air was noted as the third in the series with Fire at number four. But once The Elements came out containing all four novellas those two were reversed with Fire becoming the third story - so that is how I read them.

"...a moving investigation of why and how we allow crime to occur." is one description of these novellas. The four are interlinked from the point of crime. Although all four are different stories, in each we are given the crime, the victim(s), the accomplice, the perpetrator, and the outcome. Both the past and the aftermath are of special importance.

In this novella the real victim is the protagonist. Being a throw away child, abused by neighbors and left feeling very insecure she struck back as an adult. However her past met her head on and none of the good she had also done would save her.

Soon to read and review the fourth and last novella of this group - Air

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fire is the third book in John Boyne’s Elements series. A traumatic incident, perpetrated by the fourteen-year-old twin sons of her mother’s landlord when she was twelve, sees burns unit specialist Dr Freya Petrus exacting a sort of revenge by proxy on other fourteen-year-old boys she encounters until, with one boy, it seems to backfire rather badly.

After a childhood that no one would envy, Freya is now a wealthy, respected surgeon with a beautiful home and a flash car. She doesn’t put up with the boy’s shenanigans for too long: she takes care of it, coldly and efficiently, the way she has always handled things. But maybe she’s in for a surprise…

This story is loosely linked to the first two stories in the series by the mention of Evan Keogh and his fate, and the appearance of Rebecca Corvin, daughter of Vanessa and Brendan. A dark and compelling tale with a chilling twist.

This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Random House UK Transworld.

[Tania · Rating 5 out of 5]

Boyne’s Elements series digs into abuse, guilt, and responsibility, showing how victims, perpetrators, and enablers all get tangled in the fallout. The characters are messy, flawed, and often hard to like, and Fire—at just 176 pages—hits harder than many full-length novels.

Freya’s story is unsettling, but the mix of moral complexity and raw emotion makes it impossible to forget. John Boyne is one of my most-loved authors, and this series makes you think, makes you feel, and lingers long after the last page.

The Story: In the third novella of the quartet, Dr Freya Petrus seems to have it all—a top surgical career, a stylish flat, and a flashy car. But beneath that polished exterior lies something far darker.

[Jean · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book is beautifully crafted and written, but I regret reading it, or at least, not stopping when I realised just how nasty, truly nasty it is. I don’t expect good literature to be happy endings, puppy dogs and butterflies but I can’t fathom why or how any writer can think, “oh I know, I’ll write a novel about….” I feel dirty and sick just having read it and would probably never admit to having done so. Any less well written and it would just be another pornographic novel.

[John Gilbert · Rating 4 out of 5]

This series just gets more intense with every book. The third of four books, all loosely related with at least one character showing up in another of the series. This one focused on Freya a top level doctor, specialising in plastic surgery on burns (which ironically my youngest stepdaughter also specialises in). John Boyne is an amazing writer, this series is my first of his books, they won't be my last. Library ebook, 4+ stars.

[Melanie Caldicott · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is by far the most shocking book so far in the Elements quartet. The series explores the impact of sexual abuse from interesting and surprising angles and this novel goes to entirely new dark and twisted places. This is really tough and upsetting to read. But this is not gratuitous, as Boyne explores evil and whether it is born with a person or caused by trauma inflicted on them. I enjoyed the way Boyne plays with who society expects to be good and bad and how these labels are exactly what can help an abuser hide in plain sight. This quartet is intelligent and thought-provoking and I look forward to the final novel, Air.
This honest review is given with thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this book.

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 stars
Another great book in the elements serie, though I thought both Water and Earth were in the end more convincing. The first half of Fire was very strong and absolutely blew me away, but I had some doubts about the second half. Looking forward to Air!
Thank you Penguin Random House UK and Netgalley UK for the ARC.