What F.C. Yee did to expand and enrich the Avatar canon in the previous two duologies were my favorite Avatar related things since the ending of the original series. It's a hard act to follow, and I don't fault Ribay for not being able to match the expectations set.

That said, while this novel is good in many respects, it suffers from the worst kind of prequel-itis you can have. Where the author is more preoccupied with laying out foreshadowing for the better-known property than developing their own story. Roku is the Avatar we knew the most about from Aang's journey, and his tragic mistake of allowing a friend's ruthless ambition to continue unchecked is the shadow that haunts Aang's journey in Avatar: the Last Airbender. But this story is about a young Roku, just starting out, so he shouldn't be making that error so obviously and repeatedly from the start.

Having Roku and Sozin continue to interact during Roku's training already contradicts the canon in the episode of "The Avatar and the Fire Lord" but it also shows Ribay's biggest mistake in my opinion. He refuses to let the narrative make the choice of morally grey characters. Gyatso clocks Sozin as evil with first glance, newcomer Malaya tips us off with her mistrust of the clan leader Ulo in a way that makes everyone in their island seem dumber in comparison for not noticing it. And of course Malaya also makes the same assumption of Sozin to the point where she's determined to try and assassinate him withing five minutes of meeting him while they're both trying to rescue Roku.

Ulo was a perfect setup for a Jet like character who had extreme views but rooted in sound motives to protect. Instead he's characterized by the narrative repeatedly as untrustworthy and bad, which can be fine but makes the story feel more didactic than impactful. Sozin's big moment of choosing Roku over power momentarily feels weak since he could always just...go back to the library. The whole "it could sink by the time he gets back" has no urgency, especially since we know Zhao manages it a good 80 or so years later.

Overall, this is an okay fantasy story but not something I would give to someone to introduce them to Avatar the way I would with the Kyoshi stories. At the end of the plot, Roku's meddling made everything worse, and his spiritual growth feels stop-and-start with how oblivious he is to circumstances. I don't feel like I appreciate his character, Gyatso's, or Sozin's better for reading it. Instead, it's the opposite.