Teaser Tuesday: Tell the Wind and Fire by Sarah Rees Brennan

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Books And A Beat.
To play along just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Tell the Wind and Fire by Sarah Rees Brennan.

Tell the Wind and Fire –
Clarion Books

Maybe that is the only thing I have ever learned about love: love is when you save someone no matter what the cost.
— Chapter 3

All the more beautiful because it was fragile. Never more beautiful than at the instant before it was destroyed.
— Chapter 12

I was recently asked what made a great book for me and I said that I need the characters to be real (not relatable, but authentic) and the plot to make sense and not babble along. The writing can be the most beautiful and the idea the most imaginary, but if these two aspects aren’t met, the book could never convince me of its greatness. This could have gone either way with this retelling of A Tale of Two Cities, but I needn’t have worried ... at least not in the sense of will I love it and will it utterly destroy me, because it is Sarah Rees Brennan after all, one of my favourite tormentors. Or: One of the authors I’d cheerfully hand an imaginary stiletto and beg them to stab and twist at their leisure. And please wring the very last tear from me while you’re at it. No, really, I adored this story even if I knew how it would have to end (hoped differently certainly, but see above).
What I possibly love most would be the very clear yet delicate writing, which managed to pierce the exact meaning and evoke a multitude of emotions without forcing these experiences onto you. I didn’t mind that I was plunged into this new world with magic and strange rules and habits, because I knew for certain that it would all make sense or be explained when necessary.
There is a lot of praise due for this book: the characters, which aren’t perfect, but more real for being flawed; the retelling itself true to the original, but with its own twists and surprises and hardships; the world with its gritty reality and magic, which I would have liked to see more of; and of course (because this is where I think Sarah Rees Brennan excels) the relationships between the characters, it can’t feel more real than this. I would have loved more of this book, to have a little more insight into the world and spend more time with Carwyn all of the cast. But I also admire the brevity of the story and the impact it managed to have on me despite or because of it.

What is your absolute have to have for a story to make you describe it as great? Share ideas and teasers in the comments.