DNF-12%. Maybe it’s my mood. Maybe it’s just not the book for me? It’s very character driven and the magic is a bit confusing. It just felt like not much had happened. I know 12% doesn’t sound like that much but it is a LONG book. I might return to this one. I loved her book Masters of Death and some of her YA stuff. I’ve been trying to read this for a month.

Thank you Tor and I’m SORRY!

The three Wren siblings are dealing with their father's death before the reading of his will. Thayer Wren was a CEO of a huge tech company. He was well respected, but he definitely parented each of his children very differently.
Meredith thought by being perfect and always doing the biggest and best things her father would come to respect her. However fresh out of school with a small startup she wants to sell called Chirp, an app to make you happy. Thayer wants nothing to do with it and therefore she sells it to his main competition. The one person she has ever wholehearted loved has come back into her life to destroy her career and tell the world what a total fraud she is until she learns of her Father's death, and he is coerced into driving her to her family home to hear the reading of the will. Will the company be hers?
Arthur is currently on the campaign trail however he is also currently in love with his wife while currently cheating on her and expecting a child with his mistress. He has always wanted his father's approval and now it looks like he is never going to get it. And he doesn't know if he even wants to be reelected or if inheriting his dad's company might be something he would prefer to do. Will the company be his?
Eilidh is the youngest and the child Thayer really seemed to like the best according to all her siblings. She was a ballet dancer and had devoted her whole life to dancing until her body failed her. Then she really didn't do anything productive but work in a job her father gave her, with money her provided for her, and is returning for a mediative retreat when she learns about his death. Maybe she deserves the company, she could finally focus on something other than everything that has gone completely wrong, Will the company be hers?

A really entertaining sibling dynamic. Olivie Blake structured this story in such an entertaining way I was constantly excited to come back and hear more from the Wren's

Thank you NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This was not my favorite. It wasn't bad but it just didn't work for me. I think it was mostly how it was written that didn't work for me. I felt like there was barely a plot. I enjoyed the first 50% but as the book continued, it felt more and more disjointed. There were some humorous moments I enjoyed. Overall, I think Olivie Blake just isn't the author for me unfortunately.

I am a huge sucker for books about rivalries, so I was very into this concept from the jump. Three wealthy siblings deal with the death of their billionaire father and wonder which one will inherit his tech empire.

I loved how complex the characters were, and how the competitive sibling dynamic influenced their lives.

This book is marketed as a fantasy but I found the magic elements to be surprisingly minimal for most of the book. It felt more like magical realism. It was a contemporary story that would have felt pretty similar without any fantasy aspect.

This was as close to dark academia vibes as you can get to without a school - instead it's like dark rich people problems with light magic. Which, may not sound good, but it really was! This felt very much like Knives Out meshed with the energy of The Incandescant which I just finished reading. I could not more highly recommend it!

Magical Corporate Fraud with Grumpy Reflections
Olivie Blake, Gifted & Talented (New York: Tor Publishing, April 1, 2025). Fantasy: EBook. 512pp. ISBN: 978-1-250883-40-7.
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“…The story of three siblings who, upon the death of their father, are forced to reckon with their long-festering rivalries, dangerous abilities, and the crushing weight of all their unrealized adolescent potential. Where there’s a will, there’s a war. Thayer Wren, the brilliant CEO of Wrenfare Magitech and so-called father of modern technology, is dead. Any one of his three telepathically and electrokinetically gifted children would be a plausible inheritor to the Wrenfare throne. Or at least, so they like to think. Meredith, textbook accomplished eldest daughter and the head of her own groundbreaking biotech company, has recently cured mental illness.”
This is an especially ridiculous premise. The term refers broadly to “health conditions involving changes in emotion, thinking or behavior”. Thus, it would mean stopping people from experiencing any emotional change, even after they experience a death in the family, natural disasters, and the like. It seems this author is just having fun by suggesting whatever speculative ideas come to mind without reflecting, or weighing if they are nonsensical. The author must have realized this is an absurd notion as in chapter 10, this concept is explained as a device that “monitors brain chemistry. It delivers the appropriate SSRI subcutaneously in response to whatever your brain chemistry is doing. It takes the guesswork out of treating mental illness.” This absurd claim is followed by the explanation that the device mostly triggers people to buy Demeter’s products by pushing “serotonin” when they are in Demeter’s stores “regardless of their actual mood.” If the author had stopped at claiming all mental illness is indeed curable; this would be a poorly-conceived opinion. But the short added explanation of its subversive application turns it into a potentially “right opinion” without pages of scientific evidence to support its assertions.
The blurb continues in reference to the mental-illness cure: “You’re welcome! If only her father’s fortune wasn’t her last hope for keeping her journalist ex-boyfriend from exposing what she really is: a total fraud. Arthur, second-youngest congressman in history, fights the good fight every day of his life. And yet, his wife might be leaving him, and he’s losing his re-election campaign. But his dead father’s approval in the form of a seat on the Wrenfare throne might just turn his sinking ship around. Eilidh, once the world’s most famous ballerina, has spent the last five years as a run-of-the-mill marketing executive at her father’s company after a life-altering injury put an end to her prodigious career. She might be lacking in accolades compared to her siblings, but if her father left her everything, it would finally validate her worth—by confirming she’d been his favorite all along. On the pipeline of gifted kid to clinically depressed adult, nobody wins—but which Wren will come out on top?”
Chapter 1 begins in an unusual way for this genre: the CEO has random negative thoughts about the various people she is facing in an audience as she prepares to give a speech. She calls several names without explaining why they offend her. Some she specifies are a “traitor”, or “dorks and despots”. Not much is clarified between the overflow of hate-talk. It is clear that she would prefer to eat “a whole sleeve of pistachio macarons” and to “never rise again” from bed. Some of this commentary is a bit funny or amusing. It is better than just using some cliches, or having empty dialogue.
There is only a single direct mention of the term “telepathy” in the body of the novel: in the second half. This mention appears after half-a-page is spent on going back and force to answer repeat of the question “And then?” Jamie finally complains: “You’re not answering my question”. To which the telepath replies absurdly: “Actually, I am. You’re just not listening”. Apparently, she is forcing this guy to love her with “telepathy”, as she is not letting him “love someone better”. If she can communicate telepathically, why would he be unable to hear what she is saying telepathically: this seems nonsensical.
In the first half, there is a mention of Arthur “being an electrokinetic menace”. There are a couple dozen mentions of “electricity”, such as the “pulse of faltering electricity” that “is jarring and epileptic”, as Meredith attempts to communicate with her sister despite Arthur’s “warning” by apparently electrocuting her.
This latter discussion and electric conflict take place in chapter 59, which is set as a play with blank lines between lines of dialogue, action paragraphs, and a list of “The Players” at the beginning. This seems to be an artistic experiment that reframes empty dialogue as artsy by changing for structural formula for how these same conflicts are presented on the page.
The note that the lead considers herself to be a “fraud” interested me. But little is explained about this, beside her generally being incompetent based on a lack of knowledge expressed in what she said throughout. There is a mention that she is guilty of “around a dozen counts of felony corporate fraud”. The preceding content does not really explain what exactly she did. There are brief mentions of semi-blackmail because she has been doing improper things with “clinical patients” that contradict published claims. She acknowledges the mental-illness-curing scam was “never actually meant to work.” Instead of explaining just what kind of research this blackmailer has done, and how the fraudster went wrong, the conversation focuses on Meredith swooning or worrying about avoiding being outed for whatever this set of frauds are.
The conclusion is absurd and nonsensical. Once again, the mother-son bond is exploited as a resolution to the emotional tensions in the novel. But this time, the child is called the Monster. It is portrayed as an animal (possibly non-verbal), and the Mother is in pain, but cannot escape due to love. It is very confusing just what is supposed to be happening: this is hardly the way to entice readers to enter this book. A reader might find some amusement, so one can try it if there is enough time.
Pennsylvania Literary Journal: Spring 2025 issue: https://anaphoraliterary.com/journals/plj/plj-excerpts/book-reviews-spring-2025

If you love Olivie Blake's writing you will love this book! I am aware that Blake's poetic prose and deep character studies are not for everyone, but they are certainly for me! Gifted and Talented in another great exploration in the complexity of being human. Here we follow three very rich, very annoying and self centered children of a famous CEO of a corporation, who has suddenly died. As the kids come together to bury their dad (and find out who he has left the company to in his will) we see how each of the three became who they are and how they relate to each other in disfunctional ways. I do wish that there was a bit more magic in this world, it is not that different from our own. Described as succession with magic, this is a fiar comparison in my view and reminded me of why I was also addicted to that show. (if you like succession you will also likely like this book!) However the star of this book is the narrator and the unique voice Blake creates in her storytelling. It creates an immersive reading experience where it doesn't matter so much what happens as it is how it is told, and here it is told in a masterfully satisfying way.

I have enjoyed Olivie Blake for a long time so I was excited to get an ARC of her newest book. Unfortunately, I didn't love it. The pacing felt a little slow, the characters unlikeable to the point I didn't want to read about them or cared what happened to them, and the magic felt like a bit of an add on. I'm really bummed, I was looking forward to this! But I'll keep reading Olivie, she's such a talented writer!

It took me a minute to finish this story and I had to push through this book a little, but in the end, I have to say it was a very thought provoking and emotional rollercoaster for these characters and I was invested. They were not always likable, but the personal struggles of each of the siblings and inner demons they needed to confront made them seem relatable for anyone who has ever had a sibling rivalry and vied for the acknowledgement of their parent.

It's told from multiple POVs, so you get to know the inner thoughts and feelings of each of these characters and see the journey they each go through. At times, it seemed like so much bickering, bitterness, and despair, but then this is in the setting of a mega successful/ dysfunctional family drama after the head of the family has passed away. Instead of watching a train wreck and not being able to look away, this book was like reading it as it was happening!

I’m not much of a television watcher, so I haven’t seen Succession, but it definitely seems like this is a spin on that concept but ~with magic~. I can’t speak to whether it feels stale to those who’ve watched the show, but I had a hell of a good time.

Meredith (a tech founder), Arthur (a politician), and Eilidh (a former professional dancer) are the children of the recently deceased CEO of the world’s biggest tech+magic company. They travel back to his estate to plan the funeral and see who he trusted (or loved?) enough to leave them his shares in the company. But there are questions about the will, so while the lawyers figure it out, the three siblings turn toward their own personal crises and their relationships to one another.

Admittedly, this book starts off slow. I spent the first 25% or so wondering if I was pushing myself through yet another set of unlikeable characters in a dysfunctional family. But then I laughed for the twentieth time and the side characters were fantastic and suddenly I was deeply attached and rooting for each of them and MY HEART WAS IN IT. The plot was a little predictable, but I didn’t mind at all.

Do I think this is a “can’t miss” book? Probably not. Was it deeply entertaining? Absolutely. If you’re looking for something funny and unserious and also heartfelt, pick this up.

Succession, but with a touch of dark fantasy and all the morally grey vibes. This is a book about privilege, dynasty, class, corruption, and power. It’s about family, expectation, and spoiled siblings who grapple with their various complexes.
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So many truly awful characters that you somehow end up loving and rooting for 🩶.
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Blake’s writing makes me pause and “oof” out loud. She always gets to the heart of something about life and humanity that you can sense, but can’t quite put to words.
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Three siblings stand to take over their tech giant father’s empire. There’s Meredith, the classic over achieving eldest daughter, Arthur, the young congressman with a struggling marriage, and Eilidh, the former world famous ballerina. Which sibling will take over the empire? And will they all make it out alive?
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The thing about an Olivie Blake book is: you will come out of it learning something about life, something about yourself, that you didn’t even know you still needed to understand.
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Her books may not always be packed with big splashy action scenes, but they are packed with the violence and chaos of being human, having free will, and grappling with what it all means.
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Blake has a read on life, the human condition, that gets to the heart of things and hits you in the gut 🫶.
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Thank you @torbooks for the gifted physical book and digital ARC in exchange for an honest review!
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Gifted & Talented - Olivie Blake
4.5/5⭐️

4.5 ⭐️

When CEO and tech billionaire Thayer Wren unexpectedly meets his end, there is only one question that begs an answer — who inherits the Wrenfare throne? In this Succession meets fantasy, we follow the three Wren siblings as they grapple with the sudden reality that their father has died, along with their many preexisting individual issues (conditions if you will), and now legal complications. With a bit of dangerous magic, ambition, rivalries, dysfunctional families, and the crushing weight of unrealized potential — this book has it all.

I lost track of the amount of times I put this book down and walked away in fear of what may come. 😂 I cried. I laughed. I yelled into the ether. Ms Blake has a penchant for causing me severe emotional pain. And yet I keep coming back. Character study is one of Blake’s many strengths, this book is proof of that.

Read If You Like:
🧑‍🧑‍🧒‍🧒 Dysfunctional family dynamics
✨ Magical Vibes
💰 Inheritance drama
🌚 Morally gray characters
🏙️ Corporate and political satire
☠️ Dark humor and sharp prose

Gifted & Talented is a genre-blending novel that reads like a magical satire of corporate dynasties and familial trauma. It truly is so messy and I loved the drama with the mess!

The story focuses on what comes next when Thayer Wren, head of a powerful magitech empire dies & his three estranged adult children are pulled back into each other’s orbit—and into a legacy none of them truly wants, but all of them may destroy.

💄 Meredith is a biotech CEO with a secret so dangerous it could change the future of magic.
🗳️ Arthur is a rising political star whose ambition is only rivaled by his self-loathing.
🩰 Eilidh, once a prima ballerina, now lives in exile after a violent outburst exposed the volatility of her powers.

Their inheritance? A company soaked in secrets, magic, and ambition—and a will that pits them against each other in a competition that might ruin them all.

Their story dissects the idea of giftedness—not as a blessing, but as a burden laced with ego, isolation, and the haunting pressure to achieve.

The prose is razor-sharp, at times veering into meta commentary from God our narrator for their story and fourth-wall-breaking asides that underscore the absurdity of the story being told.

Gifted & Talented is a story about inheritance, power, and the high cost of being exceptional. It’s unsettling, incisive, and utterly hypnotic—perfect for readers who like their magic messy and their characters even messier.

While I enjoyed the story, for me it was personally missing that spark to rate higher, though I was looking forward to it after reading and loving my first book from Olivie recently.

Thanks so much to Tor for my gifted finished hardback copy and to Macmillan audio for my gifted finished audiobook copy!

Perhaps Olivie is not for me, because I found the characters (overall) are a little bit insufferable... And I really do enjoy insufferable characters, but the pretentiousness was TOOOO MUCH. I enjoyed the inner-family politics and the cutthroat nature of each person's relationship with each other and their parents, but it just reached a point where I felt like things were repetitive and painful to read.

Fun story and very interesting premise. I always love olivie blakes books! The magic felt like a small part of the story and definitely felt more character driven. Very unlikeable characters but those are my favorite to read about lol. The book had a great concept and I wish we could delve into the magic system a little more because I found it very interesting!

"Where there’s a will, there’s a war."

Despite Olivie Blake's books being on my TBR for far to long, this was my first novel by her. Given the book by Netgalley (thank you) and loved the cover- I knew I had to dive in.
This book has an errie feeling about it, if you know what I mean. Definitely descriptive and atmospheric to say the least. The characters were well thought out, creative and dimensional. At times, it was so setting/characterizing based that I forgot there was a novel taking place. This book felt heavily weighed down by the writing of it all. I felt that the storyline wasn't well developed due to the heavily detailed scenes. I am going to keep an eye out for future books by this author, but this one was just mid for me.

I was really surprised by this one. Recommended to readers who enjoyed the TV show Succession, family drama, and a dash of magical realism. The dialogue was witty and the characters will well-written.

I was eagerly anticipating this newest instalment by Blake. I generally love their writing and the stories she tells. This one however fell completely flat for me. There was no real plot, it was all character driven, but the characters are all shallow, pretentious, shells of characters, masquerading as deep and interesting when they are just garbage people. The narration style was an interesting choice. Lots of quips coming from the narrator direct to the audience. This narrator is “God” and has chapters that are entirely asides from them. I feel like there asides would make the audiobook version of this confusing. These “God” chapters gave the reader background information and details they needed but couldn’t seemingly be worked into the story another way and it seemed lazy writing to me.

I do normally like Blake’s writing style but it was very word soupy. Unnecessarily so. An editor really needed to take some red pen to this. It did not need to be so rambling and wordy. Most chapters could have cut the word count in half and it would have been a marked improvement.

The story is advertised as fantasy meets succession but honestly, the fantasy element was so minimal, it seemed disingenuous to use it in promotion.

Overall it seemed half baked and unedited and not at the level of enjoyment I usually expect from an Olivie Blake book.

I love Olivie sooo much and I was so excited to get this book. I actually got the special edition Fairyloot book of this as well. She is an autobuy author for me anyway! Loved it!

My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Spice: 🫑


I really enjoyed the writing style of this one. It's omniscient third person, the narrator being an omnipotent deity (until it wasn’t lol) observing the happenings and goings-on. It's giving a cross between the crisp dialogue in Ninth House/Hell Bent and the funny observations in A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

The siblings are all terrible people and I enjoyed how they kept ruining their own lives. 😌

I love how Olivie develops each of the siblings to process their trauma, and how she uses the magic system to manifest their pain into the story to really drive the impact. Succession in a fantasy world, and my god the DADDY ISSUES 😮‍💨

I received this as an eARC from Tor Publishing Group in exchange for my honest review, and boy howdy did I enjoy it! I’m so grateful to get the chance to review and I can’t wait for Girl Dinner to release for more of Olivie’s unique writing style!