"Gilded" by Marissa Meyer is a spellbinding reimagining of Rumpelstiltskin, blending fairy-tale enchantment with a lush and vivid historical setting. Meyer is known for her intricate world-building and captivating characters, and she once again delivers a tale that transports readers to a realm where magic, mystery, and political intrigue collide.

The strength of Meyer's storytelling lies in her ability to craft complex characters with relatable struggles. Serilda's journey from a modest seamstress to a player in the royal court is marked by growth, resilience, and a deep exploration of the choices we make when faced with extraordinary circumstances. The supporting cast, including the mysterious tsar and other magical beings, adds layers of intrigue and depth to the narrative. In "Gilded," Marissa Meyer once again proves her mastery of the genre, delivering a captivating and immersive tale that will delight both fans of fairy tales and those new to her work.

As for the audiobook, I did enjoy most of Rebecca Soler's work, though there were two of the voices that sounded very similar to each other.

Thank you to NetGalley, Macmillan Audio, and Marissa Meyer for sending me the ALC in exchange for an honest review.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* This was such a great read! I already had the second one so i was happy to find out i had the first one in my library and had yet to read it! I had actually just finished a newer, different retelling of Rumpelstiltskin and had no idea this was a retelling of it as well until i got some chapters in but i was super pumped!! Not sure what one was better because they went two different directions but this one sure is amazing!!

Loved reading this, would reread it and would buy it! Sad it took me so long to get to reading this because it was so awesome!! Loved the characters, the story and the way they changed the story! i guess i don't know the original story that well but i have read many retellings and this was a great one. I Especially loved the cursed aspects of this book as well! Would recommend and reread!

I love Marissa Meyer and I was so excited when I saw she was coming out with a new book. So we have our MC who loves to spin stories, but then gets caught in one and forced to prove that she can do what she says. But a spunkie Gild helps her out, for a price. Things just keep going from bad to worse. By 60% of the way through I wasn't sure what was going to happen. Then the ending!!! Definitely a great story and I'm excited for the next book.
The audiobook was well recorded. The reader had a pleasant articulate voice and kept a good pace for the story.

The narration was very good. I found the difference in character voices easy to recognize and the narrator had an easy voice and inflection to listen to.

Loved this!! Rumpelstiltskin retelling with awesome twists that left me waiting for the sequel! I was immediately hooked by the lush imagery and spooky tone. There horror aspects took me by surprise at first, but as the book went on the horror/fantasy blended very well for me (a total wimp.)

I do love a good re-telling, but this one just felt overly drawn out to me. I did love the world building, and I enjoyed the overall concept of the book, I just felt it was a little longer than need be. Narrator was great though, really enjoyed listening to this book.

Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher/author for providing me with an ALC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was exactly what I wanted it to be! I loved it. I will make sure to check out other books by this author. When I requested this I was just intrigued by the concept of it and I loved how it turned out. This story had a great plot and if you have read this and enjoyed it, This was so much. It was such a great story. I would say give this one a try. I will continue to follow this author. Way to go to this author for not letting me down.

I highly enjoyed the narrator of the audiobook. Kept me listening.

This one's spooky! I am a Marissa Meyer completist; I've enjoyed everything I've picked up from her which is very nearly her entire catalog. This newest outing is reminiscent of Heartless in that it is a darker story than anything Meyer told in the Lunar Chronicles or Renegades, even though those do get gritty too. This one feels like a book you should read in October - it features ghosts and monsters, and haunted castles! I know it is meant to be a Rumplstiltskin retelling and that is definitely here in spades, but I was most intrigued by the other fairytale/classic elements. Many aspects of the story reminded me of Rossetti's Goblin Market which is gothic and eerie as well. The Erlking and his Wild Hunt were also delightfully creepy and took me back to folklore obsession of younger years. I listened to the audio version of this book and have almost exclusively listened to all Meyer's books because I love Rebecca Soler's narration. She is easily in my top ten! If I have any complaints it's that the plot dragged a little at times and could have been tightened up some.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ALC in return for a fair and honest review.

I liked this book and the narrator. The only issue I had with it was it seemed to be long and some of the parts could have been lessened to keep the pace.

But generally a good time!

Thank you Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for this advance listener copy in exchange for my honest review.

I had mixed feelings about this book. It started off strong and I was really excited when I realized it was a Rumpelstiltskin retelling because even Disney tends to shy away from this semi dark fairy tale. However, this book was entirely too long.

Serilda, the daughter of a miller, loves to tell tales and when she is taken by the sinister Erlking, she weaves a tale that she can spin straw in to gold. When she is unable to complete the task, a mysterious boy appears who can help her... At a price...

As far as retellings go, this one was average. The story was good and the characters were believable, but there were entirely too many secondary characters that served little to no purpose at all and just muddled up the story. I felt like some of the characters could have been combined for less characters to keep track of. Names were hard to keep track of. I really was not a fan of the weird love story between Serilda and Gild. I thought that was a strange and unnecessary twist from the original story. There was a lot of what I would consider unnecessary fluff throughout the story that I found boring. I felt like there was about 200 pages that weren't needed. Essentially, it didn't add much to the original story. I'd give this book a straight 3 stars. I'll read the sequel, but only for closure.

I do have to rave about the audio. She was seriously one of the best narrators I've listened to and she was a big part of what kept me interested. I possibly would have given up if not for her amazing narration.

I just couldn’t ever get myself to care about the characters. The audiobook narrator, Rebecca Soler, was fabulous as always, though.

I didn't actually end up listening to this whole book on audio, but I still loved every moment of it. I am a big fan of retellings of fairy tale stories, so this book was right up my alley and I am so glad I read it. Marissa Meyer has been one of my favorite authors for a while now and this book did not disappoint. She introduced her world of fae and magic that works in such a fun and unique way and gives a story so dark and yet so familiar. The characters were intensely likeable and I did not want to leave this world behind. I can't wait for book two.

I will start of by saying I feel this one is growing on me but it's not my favorite Marissa Meyer. There was a lot of world building, and she obviously did her research, but because of that there were a lot of times I felt we were being told what was developing instead of seeing it happen. There were so many creatures to be introduced to and told about that we spent way more time on that instead of some of the main characters. I also understand that we were retelling Rumpelstiltskin but because of that on nights of the full moon we lost character development to background story. This made the pacing of the story a little weird. Sometimes the chapters between full moons would drag with exposition and others would be one or two sentences and then the next paragraph it was like oh we've prepared and its here, very off putting.
I am very excited for the next book and can't wait to see how this ends, but I feel the first book dragged some setting up the story.

This is probably one of my biggest disappointments from the fall. This dark retelling of Rumpelstiltskin by Marissa Meyer was on the top of my anticipated fall reads. However, after months of sitting on my DNF shelf, I need to give in and give a rating.

First of all, Marissa Meyer is one of my top 5 favorite authors. I could definitely feel her style in this book through the quirky but lovable characters, the detailed world building, and the artful twisting of a fairytale we all know. I just couldn't get into the frankly grotesque and confusing world that the characters in this book inhabit. I felt genuine dread while listening to this audiobook and was confused about what was happening in the plot.

I am surprised that this book is being marketed as fantasy over horror. I would certainly classify it as horror, and I was often sickened by the descriptions of violence. Trigger warning: this book does contain child death and violence toward animals and children. Those who enjoy horror or a truly dark fairytale will enjoy this return to Brothers Grimm level gore.

In the end, I didn't love Serilda enough to stick with this book. I was often confused by her reaction to things, sometimes that she should feel/show more emotion and other times that she acted utterly without sense. I also did not find the love interest compelling or believable, which damaged my ability to get lost in the pages.

The narrator did an excellent job bringing Serilda to life, and I believe she was a good fit for this book.

Ultimately, I will recommend this book to readers who enjoy dark fairytale retellings, but who are mature enough to handle the violence. I will hesitate before handing it to fans of Meyer's Lunar Chronicles.

4.5 stars. Quite predictable so far but it is a retelling so there's that to consider. I'm looking forward to book two to see how everything resolves.

I really enjoyed this Rumplestiltskin retelling. It does end with a cliffhanger though so I'm curious if there's going to be another book.

Marissa Meyer is my go-to for fairytale retellings. She always creates wonderfully modern worlds that make the story and the characters come to life in a whole new way.

Fun read!

Disclaimer: I work for a bookstore, all thoughts and opinions are my own and not affiliated with the store or company.
Thank you to Netgally and Macmillan Audio for providing me with an audiobook version of this book.

I really wanted to love this book and unfortunately it wasn’t the one for me.
I chose to give this book a 3 star rating because ultimately I did not want to give it any lower since I did not finish it. I restarted this Audiobook at least 4 times in an attempt to get hooked. Thankfully, on the fourth attempt I really did enjoy it. This did not last long. I thought the premise and the opening to be super intriguing, enjoying when she was with the kids and at home with her father. Even meeting Gild was fun. But between the 25-30% mark is where I got lost again. I had already been listening for four hours at this point, and had lost the want to try to find my way back to where it last made sense. My complaint would be that this book was too long for the content within it. So much could have been cut out that was not adding to the story. I love dark stories so the content was not an issue for me and I might eventually try this story again as I am interested to see where it goes but for now I am putting it down.

As for the audio aspect of this story. I loved the narrator and have enjoyed many of their books. Their narration held my attention for the beginning and is part of the reason I enjoyed the first quarter so much. I do however believe that due to the amount of extra content that this book had, it made the audio feel slightly chaotic at times and the pacing did not translate as well. This ultimately led to me putting this one down.
Thank you to those that allowed me to listen to this audio copy.

Although I have several of Meyer's earlier novels on my TBR, this audiobook marks my first experience with her writing - and I absolutely loved it!! I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this re-imagining of the Rumpelstiltskin story. Serilda's storytelling and golden eyes have gotten her into trouble her whole life. But on the Winter Solstice, she encounters the feared leader of the Hunt, the Erkling. When she dares to spin a story to him, it forever changes her life. It's a rather dark re-telling - with horrible villains and many, many deaths.

But Serilda and the strange young man she encounters, Gild, bring a lightness to the story. It's a riveting listen - enriched by Serilda's own stories, the many magical creatures and plenty of excitement. As with many re-tellings, there are familiar parts to the story, but also plenty of shocks here, too! And the ending that leaves Serilda in a new set of circumstances leaves me quite eager and excited for the sequel! I really can't wait!! And I am more excited than ever to get into my own TBR to read more of Meyer's earlier novels!

The audio performance here is excellent as well - the reader does a marvelous job at capturing the pure enchantment of stories spoken aloud! This is definitely a top 2021 read/listen for me!

an absolutely delightful story! Rebecca Soler took Marissa Meyer's fantastical words and told an even more magical tale! I cannot wait to find out what happens next! Thank you for letting me listen to an early copy NetGalley!

Marissa Meyer is one of my auto-buy authors so I couldn't wait to dive into this story. I love how Marissa Meyer creates really unique characters and makes classic stories her own. Seriously, this woman is the retelling queen. ⁠For this book she combined Rumpelstilkin and German mythology to create magic.
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This book felt a little repetitive and dry in parts during the middle. It's likely because Meyer was setting up for book two but it did seem to drag a little bit. The beginning and the ending though are pure gold.

I need book two ASAP. If fairytale retellings are your thing, be sure to pick this one up.

Rebecca Soler always does an excellent job narrating stories like this one. It was easy to follow and she helped bring these characters to life.