Restricted to a compound, with no fun, no laughter and most of all, no music, things can get a little claustrophobic. Combine all that with an ‘obedience strip’ branded into your flesh, one can understand the attraction the Seal youths have to Ixion – the metaphoric land of sex, drugs and rock and roll. The journey of Retra to the party Mecca of fun-loving refugees is heart of de Pierre’s first novel in the three part series ‘Burn Bright’.

Despite the promises of good times, ‘ever-night, ever-youth and never-sleep’, Retra doesn’t want to go. She’s grown accustomed to the reclusive nature of the Seals, where partying and laughter are afterthoughts, if thought at all. Her brother Joel differs though, seeking freedom the harsh prison he has been dealt. He escapes aboard the one raft connecting the two lands; the only ticket for any teen craving dancing and screwing.

Marianne de Pierres has constructed ‘Burn Bright’ in such a way that it’s one, huge, symbolic representation of the struggle teens endure molding themselves to social customs post-high school. Her ‘obedience strip’ (read: sheltered upbringing) causes her pain constantly as she battles to maintain her engrained sense of right and wrong in the provocative Ixion, and when she can’t locate her brother Joel, she’s sucked in. Luckily, the supporting characters Retra encounters along the way are probably more interesting than her, giving the book a lot more depth than first anticipated.

After all, it’s a story of self-discovery for our protagonist Retra, who, through several tangents and sub-plots, becomes a part of Ixion’s hedonistic rituals. Mix in a bunch of semi-dark fantasy creatures and a writhing belly of intrigue beneath Ixion’s lavish presentation, you’ve got a YA novel that is likely to satisfy most fantasy readers who’ve grown with Harry Potter and the likes of Twilight. Older readers will probably grow tired of the never-ending symposium of metaphors for frigidity and the club-scene, but the prose moves fast and smoothly enough not to get too agitated.

A good opener to a refreshing fantasy series by a now seasoned Australian author, with enough suggestive subplots left untied, the rest of the novels in the series will surely not suffer from having style but nowhere to go.

- David Canellis