Silver Elite is the literary equivalent of a beautiful house with questionable foundation work, it looks great from the curb, but step inside and you'll notice some concerning creaks. While Wren makes for a compelling protagonist and the premise with the dystopian vibes/modified people/etc has potential, the worldbuilding feels frustratingly shallow. The book suffers from an identity crisis, where I thought we would be getting a dystopian rebellion with all the Hunger Games marketing, there was instead a lot of "maybe the oppressors aren't so bad after all" in ways that would make Katniss Everdeen rage. It's the kind of read that keeps you turning pages despite yourself, but also leaves you with more questions than answers and a nagging feeling that something's just... off. I couldn't even love the MMC because he would say some WILD opinions and Wren would just gloss over it, so it's not like he's learning or growing, he's just staying terrible.

Proceed with cautious curiosity, you might enjoy the ride if you stay at surface level.

I was a bit apprehensive going into this book because of the mixed reviews—some readers love it, some are obsessed, and others didn’t enjoy it at all.

Right away, it gave me Fourth Wing (minus the dragons) meets Divergent vibes, and I’ll be honest—it made me cringe a little how familiar the storyline and tropes felt. It was like reading something I’d already read before.

That said, as the story progressed, it became an easy and engaging read. The romance between Wren and Cross started to pull me in, and of course—the spice🥵? Top tier🔥. By the end, I was hooked. I’ve since learned this is technically a dystopian, but my brain 100% processed it as a romantasy, and I’m not even mad about it 😅.

While some parts of the story were predictable, there were definitely a few twists and turns I didn’t see coming—especially the ending. That last stretch of the book really surprised me and pulled me in hard.

A few complaints though: I really wish we got more explanation about how the whole system works. Wren (the FMC) could be a little annoying and reckless—she made some pretty questionable decisions—but she’s a 20-year-old who’s lost everything, so I can kind of forgive her for that. Cross (the MMC) was... a bit of a douche at first, borderline abusive in some scenes. There was something about him I didn’t like in the beginning, but he grew on me as the story went on. He definitely evolved, and by the end I was warming up to him. Is he a new book boyfriend? Maybe. (But let’s be real—he’s no Xaden 🖤.)

One thing that really grated on me was how often Wren was reminded she wasn’t “Cross’s type” or that “he doesn’t usually go for girls like her.” Like—who.fucking.cares? He clearly likes her. Why did that need to be mentioned multiple times? It felt unnecessary and a little insulting 🙄.
Also... Fuck you, Lyddie. IYKYK.
Shoutout to Kaine though—total fave of mine the whole way through 🥰.

Overall, I loved it. I really enjoyed it and I’m excited for book two!

The book started off strong, but then lost its appeal quickly.

The imaginary future world in this book was what I really liked (although the world building was lacking). There were lots of interesting aspects, such as the Blacklands. But we get sooo excruciatingly little of this really interesting world that I felt a bit duped.

The whole idea of Mods was catchy, I wanted more. It was because of the Mods that I persevered with this book until the end. I wanted to squeeze every bit of information about Mods out of the story.

In basically the very beginning of the book, something super dramatic happens, and it bugs me so so so much that the main character was not more upset because of it. She seems moderately sad, but then sort of gets over it and goes on. This one thing made me feel very disconnected from the story. This one event really should have been dramatized a lot more. Think Ellie’s character development in season 2 of The Last Of Us, IYKYK. In fact, I think we were really robbed of a proper glimpse into Wren’s past and especially her relationships with people closest to her. What I got were pretty superficial interactions, but I needed depth.

I think the character of Wren had potential but was trying too hard to be edgy. And just like with Kaine, I felt Wren was using her overconfidence to try to conceal her insecurities.

Speaking of Kaine, I liked his character development and I think he had potential as a love interest for Wren. But it bugged me how Wren keeps describing him as “flirty”. I’m not really sure if it’s hetero culture or what, because if a woman was being as gross to me as Kaine has been since the beginning, I would not consider that “flirting”. I doubt any lesbian would. Being gross and overly sexualizing women is just not the same as flirting. But like I said, I liked his character development. And if this was real life, then it would have been painfully obvious that he is pretending to be this self-assured big guy to hide the fact that he is very unsure of himself and is afraid of not coming off cool enough. But ok, this is super normal for teenagers, so I don’t have a lot of problems with this.

However, I don’t feel the same about Wren’s “love” interest. I mean, it was never love, c’mon. It was pure lust since the beginning. And, honestly, there’s nothing wrong with that, with knowing that you want this specific thing. However, once that gets showed down our throats as “love” and “romance”. I found that laughable at best.

Since we are on the topic of romance. I read the reviews and quite a few people thought Wren was insufferable, but I found that her love interest was the truly insufferable person. I couldn’t understand how old he is supposed to be, but clearly older than Wren. Wren is very young, like what, 19? I can overlook her character flaws because she still has lots to learn, but this love interest guy, oh boy. Here’s my opinion of him - he is a) toxic b) toxic c) very toxic. And again, that’s fine(ish) if the book was honest about it, but I couldn’t help but feel that the book was so trying so hard to package this whole thing as something that it clearly was not. The love interest is clearly the type of guy who has it all, literally, and he does not hesitate to ride this wave of privilege. But it’s not even about privilege, it’s about power. And the moment the author chose to describe the guy as big and muscular and the girl as small and dainty, I gave up on this whole romance idea. It’s not romance to me, it’s a tug of war where the man is designed to be constantly winning and executing his power, and in this case he literally has so much advantage over the main character. If this was real life, this would have been that perfect sort of scenario for the woman to end up dead. Maybe because I’m not into men, maybe because I have been the tallest person in class until grade 8 (and still tall, so I don't understand the appeal of dating someone who's 1,5 times bigger than me), maybe because I want straight women to also have something better in life I just couldn’t vibe with this.

And then somewhere halfway along the book the vibes shifts a lot and lots of very convenient things happen. It's like suddenly the puzzle pieces all come to together, except it felt like the pieces were all from different puzzles and the author had to use a hammer to really force them to fit. I was considering giving the book 3 stars but this decline towards the end, that's what changed my mind. Overnight the main characters were nearly different people, There were also just so many plot holes and things that didn't make sense.

I think this book could be great if improved with the help of a good editor. But the way it is right now, it doesn't feel finished.

I loved this book, I really enjoyed the world building especially at the beginning- really reminded me of Fallout/ Westworld in terms of the dystopian western and regression of society. The relationships in the book were great, I loved the relationship between Jim and Wren and how that developed as the book went on. I also LOVED Kaine as a character!
The only thing stopping it being a five star for me is I would’ve liked more detail around the military regime and how it had come into place in the first place. I think that would’ve played nicely into the characters of Cross and his brothers and how they’re defined by their father and the significance of the mantle the general holds. I also think it would’ve added more urgency and meaning to the plight of the rebellion and why Wren feels so conflicted as she progresses through Silver Elite.
However saying that overall I did really like it and I hope these are things that will be developed as the series goes on!

I love me a dystopian romance. People have been comparing this to hunger games but I don’t see that at all other than it being dystopian. If a comparison were to be made, it would be to Divergent. But the world building and situations are way more detailed here. I will caution that this is high on the spice scale. For some people, that’s a bonus. It usually scares me away but it didn’t get dirty until after halfway through and I was thoroughly invested in the characters and relationships at that point.

Our leading lady, Wren, has exceptional cognitive abilities and is part of a population of “aberrant” or “modified” people who have to hide their abilities due to the current political rule. These abilities came about after a war as a result of radiation and other war-like outfall. Wren ends up in the midst of her enemy and has to play a clever game of deception and playing both sides.

The ending felt a little rushed but maybe it was just all the chaos that was happening to Wren. The cliffhanger is excruciating and I’m chomping at the bit for the second book.

I loved The Hunger Games and the nostalgic dystopian inspiration, but I found the execution wasn’t for me.

*Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.*

Absolutely loved Silver Elite! It’s like Divergent meets Fourth Wing—a fast-paced dystopian romance with high-stakes training, forbidden powers, and sizzling tension. The world-building is well done, and it was impossible to put down. Can’t wait for the sequel!

I had so much fun reading Silver Elite! The story gave me a strong sense of nostalgia with its dystopian elements—it reminded me of the kind of books I used to devour in high school. The romance was a fun and engaging part of the plot, adding just the right amount of emotional stakes without overwhelming the story.

While the world-building wasn’t very deep or detailed, I actually found that to be a plus in this case. It made the book easy to follow and allowed me to focus more on the characters and the action.

Wren has a lot of skills and hides some genetic modifications that have resulted in additional powers. The current political regime wants to eradicate everyone who has been modified and has powers. It evoked both the X-Men stories and the Hunger Games. Wren and her uncle have been off the grid until a series of events throws Wren right into the enemies camp. Fortunately she lands on her feet but ends up in a boot camp for an elite military group managed by Wren.

I enjoyed Wren's skills and thought processes. She's relatively inexperienced and I"ll be curious about how she matures through the series. There's an emphasis on action and plot in this book- it's definitely setting the stage for the rest of the series. I'm hopeful for more background and character development and am very curious about what happens next.

4.25 stars

This is exactly the kind of book I want when I’m looking for escapism. From the first page, I was captured by Wren, and the story held my attention throughout. I’ve read many books about high-stakes competitive schools/training, but the Academy felt unique enough where it wasn’t repetitive. The magic system is interesting, but does not involve complicated world-building and is easy to conceptualize.

Although I was reminded of some of my favorite dystopian YA reads while reading, this absolutely has an adult edge. And that’s what I love about it. I’m not upset that this book was spicy, there’s plenty of dystopian literature out there with more complex plots and social/political commentary, but less options when you want page-turning suspense combined with a forbidden romance.

I would recommend this book to those wanting a binge read, a book to read on a trip, or anyone needing to break a reading slump. It’s intense, entertaining, and fun. It has some twists and turns, some I expected (but still enjoyed), and one that I didn’t see coming at all. No question, I’ll be reading the next installment!

I have seen people call Silver Elite a cross between the divergent series and hunger games - for adults - it was fantastic! Wren is whitty, smart, a trained warrior and is walking a fine line being a spy in a world where she knows one wrong move will get her killed. I liked the banter between the two main characters, there were enough twists and turns throughout the book that kept it intriguing and had me guessing what would happen next. Does it have some of your typical Romantasy tropes? Yes - but they’re fun and it was still a great read!

First of all, this did not need to be five hundred pages long. The plot was not coherent enough, nor the characters interesting enough, nor was the prose well-written enough to justify such a page count. For a book of such length, it really didn’t fell like much of anything went down at all.
I had to keep reminding myself whilst I read, that this is a DYSTOPIAN book. If I didn’t know beforehand that that was the intended genre, I absolutely would not have guessed it to be so. The dystopian elements—criticism of heirarchy and corrupt government, fighting back against said forces, poignant political, social, and economic factors in reality—just were not there, and were unengaging when they tried to be. It very much failed in its genre, and that never bodes well for the content of the story.
Our main character, Wren, was the most uninspiring main character I have been in the head of. Not only was she frustrating, annoying, petulant, and often stupid, but it took me until 80% of the book to even learn what hair colour she had. I kept forgetting her name and any semblance of what she looked like, and her personality was lacking to say the least, and very infuriating. She describes herself as impulsive, when in reality she IS just stupid. She endangers herself and the people she supposedly loves (though she her treatment of ‘friends’ left everything to be desired) with her reckless and brainless behaviour, and then is often surprised when things take a turn for the worst! I was shocked towards the end of the book where she removes the very thing keeping her from being discovered while she ‘infiltrates’ the military, though I should’ve expected her to do such a thing only for the reason of ‘proving her love’ to her superior officer, and then act dumbfounded when she is turned in for it! Living in her head was unenjoyable and I disliked her heavily.
The other characters are fairly obviously walking stereotypes that get little to no development: there are the quintessential ‘psychopath’ type boys who enjoy hurting people and are creepy towards women including our main characters; the POC queer best friend who gets absolutely ruined by the story and suffers greatly in the shade of the main character who is allowed to act in strange and foolish ways; the forced girl-hate just because she used to date the man the main character has an incredibly obvious crush on. None of them except one at certain times intrigued me at all, and any of their deaths fell incredibly flat because I did not care for any of them.
The relationships of our main character were all flat, lust-focused, and dull. There was no tension nor connection with any of them, and certainly not with the main love interest. He had no distinguishable personality bar being the ‘dystopian’ equivalent of a dark haired, extremely tall and buff shadow man. His dialogue had me laughing out loud at times with how ridiculous and completely non-sexy it was, which at least made the reading experience a little better. If spice in your ‘dystopian’ book is your cup of tea, that’s awesome, but the constant reminders that she was sleeping with the people determined to murder every single one of her people was, in fact, a major turnoff.
The plot was questionable and downright stupid at times. Nothing really happened until about 80% (coincidentally when I learned her hair colour for the first time) and any action that followed was almost as dull as the training sequences and awful banter scenes. The rebellion was disjointed and seemed incompetent, especially when they wouldn’t use the convenient resource they had installed right in the base of their enemy. Lack of communication and dystopian features just made this fall entirely flat.

There can be no comparison to The Hunger Games here, in fact it felt very Divergent instead.

The hype of this book made me slightly worried, and I had hoped for a great read.

I needed more; it was a YA fantasy dressed up as an adult with some 'spicy' parts, but I wish for more depth. I went in for a deep world-building, character growth, and a new spin on the dystopian reads.

This has been all over my fyp and I just had to read this! It is so good you don’t even know what is coming! This is a great read and everyone should read it!!

I read about 80% of this book before i realised i didn’t care about anything that was happening. It felt like it was a mix of Ai and an author who didn’t care writing it

New TOP read of 2025 read for me!!

I picked this on up and it wasn’t in my usual comfort zones, I was looking for a different kind of story and this was IT! Honestly, I saw military and was unsure but I started reading and there was a pull, I couldn’t take it! I NEEDED to read this book. Absolutely NEEDED to know Wrens story!

This book kept me dancing on the edge of what will happen next, teasing me with bits and pieces to pull me further down - I still don’t know where I stand - uprising or company but I do know I need more!! More of these characters, and this whole world that exists! The shocks and surprises, the heart warms and wretches!

Unfortunately I didn’t love this one. I struggled to connect with the story and found myself getting bored while reading it. I ended up buying the audiobook to help me get through it, and I honestly think I would have ended up dnfing if I hadn’t used one of my audible credits on it.

The last 20% was honestly the best part of the book, I actually found myself getting invested. Not sure if I’ll continue the series though.

Like many readers, it’s hard not to draw parallels between Silver Elite and The Hunger Games — and honestly, I don’t mind one bit. The Games had President Snow; Silver Elite gives us General Redden. The Capitol and Peacekeepers become the Continent and The Company. Numbered Districts? Here, we have lettered Wards. And then there's Wren — our fierce, impulsive, sassy, and strong FMC who channels all the fire of a Katniss while still standing firmly in her own right.

So yes I will say that a certain dystopian formula is evident — but guess what? It works. And I am SO here for it.

I’d also seen Silver Elite compared to Fourth Wing, so when I opened to a map and prepared myself for a maze of impossible-to-pronounce names and overly elaborate worldbuilding, I was so relieved to find regular-sounding character and place names. It made diving into the story the perfect blend of easy and epic!

I loved the rich worldbuilding and fast pacing — I never feel lost or bogged down. I has great “found family” vibes (as confusing as these are for Wren as she wrestles with which side she should be feeling for), and the enemies-to-lovers dynamic brings that delicious slow burn (yes, it gets spicy), and the ongoing theme? Trust no one. Lie to everyone, was delicious.

Even though I guessed the big twist ahead of time, it didn’t lessen the thrill for me, the strength of the characters and the world kept me hooked right to the end.

If you enjoy your dystopian reads with a side of sass, a dash of danger, and a slow burn romance that simmers — Silver Elite delivers. Bring on the next book! I received a copy of this book for review, all opinions are my own.

A 19 hour audiobook, but I read it in 8. I know this JUST came out, but I already need the next one. I heard so many people talking about this book when it was released then saw it on NetGalley. Had to shoot my shot for an ARC, so thank you to Random House!

This book was a knockout. A good balance of things I expected but some twists I did NOT. The end? Leaves you satisfied but on the edge of your seat. If you were obsessed with the Hunger Games or Divergent in middle school and you now love romance books, this is DEFINITELY the book for you.

Mild spoilers ahead?
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- Hunger Games dystopian style setting & dictator with the main city then surrounding areas under military control
- Divergent vibe, hunting the “mods”, military training sections and the main romance giving Tris/Four vibes
- World building was easy to follow, love the telepathic powers from radiation? Cool
- Liked the element of mystery with Wolf , even though I was pretty sure where it was going, I was excited about it

Hello New Fourth Wing Book.

I disagree...but that's what I've been hearing.

This was...good? Okay? It was nothing spectacular and nothing I haven't read before but it was well paced, I read it quite quickly, and I would say that I enjoyed myself for the most part.

I am not sure why people are saying this is an adult Hunger Games. Let me be clear when I say it is NOTHING like the Hunger Games. This is more like an adult Divergent. But, I think a lot of marketing for this went to saying it was "bringing back dystopian" and honestly I wouldn't really call this dystopian either. It had some of the elements, but the real things like politics and stakes and government issues that make a dystopian real, were lacking here. This was definitely more focused on Wren as a character, her choices, and her romance. Which is fine, but it is not dystopian.

The biggest thing that made me mad at this book is that what I assume to be the "biggest plot twist" was so glaringly obvious I knew it from the very first page it was introduced, (chapter 1), and when it was revealed (in chapter 45-ish) I was rolling my eyes so hard. No, it wasn't obvious to Wren, but to the readers, if they have ever read a fantasy before, my god was it obvious.

The romance in here was pretty good, I do love a slow burn. But I do think it fell to the sex vs. substance issue that a lot of current romances have. The first time they really have a true REAL moment as a potential couple and are not lying to each other is immediately ruined by smut. I just wanted ONE conversation. ONE. But of course, the smut takes control as it does in all fantasy and romantasy now days. Also a lot of the smut here had really cringy dialogue and references to body parts.

Overall, I was not kicking my feet and giggling, this wasn't anything revolutionary, but I will be continuing the series and I did enjoy myself for the most part.