The Ironside Academy series is a why choose fantasy romance with dystopian elements that was pitched in its description as a “guilty pleasure” read. As much as I hate the term, I generally enjoy the books it describes, and I’d been lacking in why choose romances lately, so I gave it a go.
Isobel Carter is Gifted, a distinction other than human thanks to their special powers. Most Gifted are kept separate from humans in settlements, where they live in poverty and struggle for basic rights. But Isobel is different. Her father was an Icon, the winner of a competition held at Ironside Academy, and therefore allowed to live with wealth and success among the humans. Now its Isobel’s turn to go to Ironside and compete to become and Icon at the end of her fifth year.
However, Isobel is a Sigma, a type of Gifted at the bottom of the food chain in which Alphas are at the top. As a Sigma, she can feel and absorb the negative emotions of everyone around her, something she has had to make good use of growing up with her abusive father. At Ironside, she faces even more bullying and brutality, mostly at the hands of ten Alphas who quickly become her enemies. With cameras rolling at all times and a reality TV show for humans about the competition airing every week, Isobel has to find a way to boost her popularity to survive.
The premise of this series is its high point. It’s dystopian in a disconcerting way, with cameras broadcasting their every move to humans for entertainment, and a group of human officials controlling the strings for all the students like puppets. With fated mates and enemies-to-lovers tropes, the framework of this book was promising.
It turns out, ten love interests are officially too many in a why choose romance, or at least in this one. Especially in the beginning, it was incredibly difficult to keep them all straight. It also takes several books before they all truly become distinct from each other, although there are a few early standouts.
In all of the Ironside Academy books, the chapters are long, but time moves quickly. Weeks pass in the span of a few pages, but for large swaths of the books, nothing much is actually happening. The first two books could easily have been combined for one book, with many full chapters cut. The remaining books pick up a bit, but still suffer from a distinct lack of engaging action.
The most significant problem with these books is the plot. In each book, one or two major things happen and the rest just feels like filler. When that filler is spicy, then sure, that’s fine although still not ideal, but when it’s just dancing, exercising, and pondering, it’s grows dull quite quickly.
The banter between these characters is great and makes for another high point in the series. However, this series is an extremely slow burn, with absolutely zero spice in the first book. Readers get one real kiss at the very end of the very last chapter. The spice finally kicks in around book three, but at least one of the love interests, frankly I can’t keep track of them all so maybe more, is still a virgin by book five. There is obviously nothing wrong with being a virgin or waiting, or whatever, but dragging out that aspect of the plot where these relationships are building at an utterly glacial pace is a poor choice in a book that also suffers from a lacking plot.
That in combination with the excess of indistinct main characters and the slow arrival of their backstories to distinguish them makes for a frustrating read. I am not sure I would have stuck with Ironside Academy for as long as I did if I wasn’t an obsessive reader who can’t stand leaving stones unturned.
This series is not yet complete. The sixth book is coming in summer of 2025, but this is the end of the road for this reader. Probably. I really do hate not knowing what happens at the end of a story.
Writing: 2
Spice: 3 (each book is spicier than the last, this score is an average)
Kindle: free with Kindle Unlimited
Paperback: around $25 each
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