***Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.***

I devoured the first book in this series in one sitting, and this sequel was no different! Noni is a master of voice and tension, with a particular talent for character development and the art of the subtle plot twist that eventually rears consequences you never saw coming.

The Gilded Cage by Lynette Noni continues to fill out the world that she starts in The Prison Healer. Kiva Meridan has survived Zalindov Prison and is now living with the royal family while continuing to hide her true identity. As she becomes more intertwined with the family and her own family keeps cropping back up, she must decide where her true loyalties lie. With her magic becoming more insistent and visible at inopportune times, Kiva must work hard to hide. As her brother and sister continue to push the rebels agenda, Kiva stands in the middle.

After reading “The Prison Healer”, I couldn’t wait for it’s sequel. I was ecstatic to be approved for an ARC of “The Gilded Cage” and it did not disappoint!

After Kiva is out of prison, she goes with Jaren to stay at the palace. She also reunites with her siblings. Throughout it all, Kiva has determine where her loyalties lay and what the real truths are. There are many twists in this book that I was able to figure out ahead of time, but will be perfect for middle grade readers.

Thank you to #NetGalley for an ARC of #TheGildedCage by #LynetteNoni in exchange for an honest review. I can’t wait to read the next book in this amazing YA Fantasy series!!

The ending had me absolutely losing my mind! I was not expecting another cliffhanger at all. I'm absolutely enamored with this series. The moment I finished reading, I was scavenging Goodreads for the next release date. While the concept might sound familiar, the execution is totally unique. The characters are well developed, the lore is interesting; this would make a fantastic TV show! I'm crossing all my fingers and toes that Netflix or another company picks it up for a screen adaptation.

This is one of the most captivating YA fantasy reads I've read in ages despite the fact that I'm mad at Noni for ending on such an epically good cliffhanger (you've been warned).
Despite Kiva's slight tendency to be (understandably) melodramatic, she's a fun character, and seeing her character arc develop as she is forced to decide between her blood family and her found family really pulled me in. Jarin and his family, Tipp, Kiva's family, there is a plethora of characters for the reader to connect with and get pulled further into the story.
The pacing is wonderful, giving readers just enough to make you want to keep turning pages frantically without feeling like we're racing to the end or just filling page count. It makes the many revelations that occur over the course of the book feel organic. You get time to process each new revelation without feeling overwhelmed
Now, in all honestly, nothing is particularly new when it comes to storytelling. You can pretty much figure out where things are going if you really pay attention. But, and a big but here, the way it's written and presented makes you ignore all of that and just enjoy the ride. It's a testament to Noni's writing skills.
I confess to not having read book 1 yet, so I can confidently say that this is a book that you can jump into with no problem. The details of the world are explained as you read and the plot develops in a way that I never felt lost or if I was missing a very important piece of the background needed to enjoy it.
Overall, I finally get all the hype about this series and will be happy to join this particular hype train.

Many very happy thanks to NetGalley and Clarion Books for the phenomenal read!

Loved the continuation! It picked up right where the first left off and away it went. Really easy to keep up with the characters.

Lynette Noni brings readers back to the world of The Prison Healer with the second book in the series, The Gilded Cage. We pick up where we left off in Kiva’s story, but the plot only thickens in this spell-binding and captivating story.

For those of you asking whether this book is just as good as its prequel, The Prison Healer, the answer is HELL YES!! It’s so easy to fall back into the Kiva’s world and see what is going on with these characters after the events in Book 1.

Without being too spoiler-y, the plot is engaging and it makes this book severely binge-worthy. On top of that, the cast of characters and the development of the main characters is fantastically done and it makes me SO EXCITED for Book 3 to come out (which better be as soon as freaking possible)!!!

Basically, if you haven’t checked out this series yet then I don’t know what you’re waiting for! This book is a fantasy lover’s dream and should be on everyone’s TBRs!

*I received an ARC from Clarion Teen via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

The Gilded Cage shows Kiva's life post-escaping Zalindov. This is a decent sequel and acts as an interesting look at how we choose to define ourselves and our identity through Kiva's struggles with this. The beginning lags a bit with showing day-to-day activities, and at the same time somehow still seems to not have enough world-building. While the situation that Kiva is dealing with on paper is very high stakes, the emotional translation of this didn't come through very well to me through the story.

A few things I really liked:
- Casual queer rep (side characters)
- While it felt a little heavy handed/obvious at times, there were some great moments of "don't let this one thing define you" or "you are not only what has happened to you" that I think are really nice things for teen readers to hear
- I enjoyed the bit of reality that Kiva was not inherently athletic

A few things I thought could have been better:
- Just as the first book felt like it had "insta-love", Kiva has a friendship that feels like "insta-friend"
- I wish I had been more surprised by the twist at the end. Not that I expected it, but I think this comes from a missing emotional connection with the characters, so even if something should be "surprising" I felt like I didn't know them well enough to feel the impact of it

Gahhh what can I say I'm obsessed with this series I haven't been able to put the books down. I'm anxiously awaiting the third book can't wait till next November

An incredibly slow first half bogs down this sequel, but the second half of the book more than makes up for it. I wish authors were given more time with books but that doesn't seem to be allowed nowadays.

The Gilded Cage continues the journey of Kiva after she successfully completed the Trial by Ordeal (from The Prison Healer). In this sequel, she finds herself surrounded by enemies and struggles with her loyalties to her family. Overall, I thought that this was a very well written sequel and I was definitely intrigued by the world that Lynette Noni created. After reading The Prison Healer and giving it a 3 stars, I will say that The Gilded Cage felt pretty similar in terms of the complexity of the plot and the character relationships. It felt pretty stereotypical and I was not surprised by any of the plot twists. But as someone who was just curious about what would happen (since The Prison Healer ended in a huge cliffhanger), I would say that I still enjoyed this book for what it was.

Reviewed on Goodreads.

DNF at 22%.

Why did I think this was a duology?? :-/ Around the 20% mark I started getting the sneaky suspicion that there was just more and more being added and no resolution in sight, and so I flipped to the end (I'm not always proud of it, lol). What I read there just made me super uninterested in continuing. I signed up for a duology in my head. The plot beats we were hitting were feeling very familiar and not in a comforting, this is my jam kinda way. Nothing was glaringly <b>bad</b>, and it's probably more of a case of, "it's not you, it's me," but after a month and a half of sitting on my "currently reading" shelf, I have come to the conclusion that it's never gonna happen.

I received a free review copy from the publisher via NetGalley. All my opinions are my own.

I received this and as an eARC to read for free in exchange for my honest review. Thank you to NetGalley and Clarion Books for giving me access.

Compared to The Prison Healer, I didn't enjoy this as much. The feeling of the story shifted into something else entirely. That being said, It was still an interesting read that kept me interested until the end. I would go as far to say you could get away with reading it without have read the first as they are so different (you might just miss some backstory that is explained).

I requested this before I read the first book. The reveal at the end of the first book annoyed me, and I'm honestly not rooting for the people we're supposed to be rooting for. Will probably get this from library when I'm in the mood for YA fantasy.

I am incredibly late in getting this review finished, so apologies to the author. Now, I read the Prison Healer and died a little when it ended on a cliff hanger, so I was hoping for a slightly less anxious ending...but this was not to be. Another cliff hanger! I'm getting ahead of myself.

The Gilded Cage is the continuing life and adventures of Kiva Meridan. Now that our heroine has survived Zalindov prison, she finds herself in a slightly different cage, but a cage all the same. She's living in the lush palace but with her feelings for the prince deepening and finding herself unable to trust her siblings, Kiva is still trapped. Can she untangle all of the webs of information before something terrible happens?

I found this second book incredibly good. I can see the inspiration from Sarah J. Maas' work still but the characters, scenes, and voice are all different and unique. While I did find Kiva's waffling feelings a little grating at times, I did remind myself that the intended audience is not me. I look forward to the third novel and hopefully #3 won't end on another cliff hanger.

Lynette Noni is a master of suspense and heartbreak. She pulls you in so close to her characters that you feel every emotion they do. I'd eagerly awaited the appearance of this book and I was not at all disappointed by it.

Thank you NetGalley for sending me an ARC of this book in exchange of an honest review.

Oh God where do I even begin!! This book was amazing!! I was afraid that this book was going to suffer the ill-fate that many second books in trilogies suffer, where they tend to be bland and boring in comparison to its first and last book, but this was not the case for this one. I was entertained throughout all of the book. Seeing Kiva’s relationship with her family, her relationship with Jaren, and even the Vallentis family was great. Though I’m not sure if I can forgive Linette Noni for leaving us in yet another cliffhanger, but the plot twists do make up for it.

I’m seeing that both cliffhangers and plot twists or something that she does a lot, and I’m not complaining. 👀

I read the second half of The Gilded Cage in one day and the ending got me excited for the next book in the series. It surely successes all my expectations.

The plot was more intense than in the Prison Healer and many plot twists kept me interested in the story. I love that the author allows readers to discover the world outside the prison. We finally started getting information about other places and kingdoms.

Besides expanding the world, The Gilded Cage also introduces new characters to the readers and develops the relationship between characters we've already met in the previous book. Meeting the royal family and hearing about their secrets was a great experience. What I loved is the internal conflict in Kiva's head. It's well done and allowed me to get to know her even better.

This book made me feel so many emotions: anger, happiness, stress- especially while reading the last few chapters. The ending was amazing and unexpected. It's a great continuation of the story and I can't wait to read the third book.

Thank you NetGalley and Clarion Books for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

4/5 stars

I really enjoyed the second installment of this book. Kiva has to make some decisions that affect her character. And has to decide what is really important for her.

This book definitely had me more stressed than usual. It was sometimes hard to relate to Kiva because of knowing there is more to the picture. I also would get a little annoyed at the lack of communication. Which I understand why but to the reader it was like just talk!! We can figure everything out.

Overall enjoyed the book and looking forward to the 3rd installment!

Thank you to Netgalley for this e-arc!

I loved The Prison Healer and I was so excited going in to this book. One of the reasons I loved The Prison Healer was because it kept me guessing and this book was no different. The Gilded Cage starts where The Prison Healer leaves off and I loved seeing all the characters again! This book kept me on the edge of my seat the whole time, I knew from the last book that Lynette loves a good plot twist so I knew something was coming and when it happened my mind was blown 🤯 My stress levels were high and leaving on such a cliffhanger is not fair! I need the next book ASAP!!

Overall I loved this book and think this series is a hidden gem and everyone should read it.