Gild by Raven Kennedy

While I think some reviewers were overly harsh, this was one of the more… interesting books I’ve read. In a very unsettling way. I skipped a lot. I was aware of the content warnings, so I have no one to blame but myself. However, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting from some of the reviews I read. 

Auren? Boring for the most part. She’s only truly interesting when she’s interacting with the other “saddles”. Namely, Rissa and Polly but specifically Rissa. I liked Rissa more than Auren. 

Sail? Don’t fucking talk to me about him. He and Digby are the only men I liked in this whole damn book and I don’t even know what happened to Digby. I’ll never forget how my boy Sail was done dirty. 

The revelation at the end was meh. I didn’t suspect it, which was nice, but there was also absolutely ZERO foreshadowing up to that point, so… like what really was the point of it? It shouldn’t have been such a shock. Looking back on the book as a whole, it should make sense. The only thing that really makes it make any kind of sense is her being kept in the cage. Maybe I’m being too nitpicky, but my own editor has chastised me for this exact thing. 

I’m genuinely curious about the Fae Commander Rip and how he’ll play into Auren’s story, but I swear to god if he’s just another rapist, I’m going to start writing significantly harsher and far more scathing reviews as we go. (Oooh, so scary.) Hopefully Auren and Rissa gain more personal autonomy throughout the series and step into their villain era. I lived an abusive relationship in my late teens, I don’t want to read an entire series about one. One book is good enough and then have the MFC move into her healing journey. “Dark fantasy” is shady, not rapey.