6 MF STARS
Book of the Year. No competition.

Rose in Chains by Julie Soto is everything. The only book that even comes close is Manacled, and honestly? This stands firmly on its own as a masterful reinvention of that Dramione energy.

Enemies to lovers. Secret lovers. Tension so thick it hurts.
The slow burn? Excruciatingly good.
The emotion? Gut-wrenching.
The writing? Flawless.

There’s a mother’s love in this that absolutely broke me. And the structure—alternating between present day and flashbacks—adds such a deep, emotional layer to the story. You feel every choice, every consequence.

The dark themes are handled with such grace and care. It’s heavy at times, but never gratuitous. Just right.

And that ending?? I’m already emotionally unwell just thinking about what book two will bring. It’s not even out yet and I need it yesterday.

Huge thank you to Hachette and NetGalley for the ALC. This book has me in a chokehold.

First off, I want to thank Hachette Audio and NetGalley for the opportunity to review this book. Getting to review my most anticipated read of the year before it’s published is such an honor.

This review contains SPOILERS.

This book was a masterpiece. As a lover of the fanfic I was NERVOUS. I knew undertaking a whole new set of world building would be a challenge, but in Julie Soto we trust. Not only did I find the world building well thought out and impactful, I found the character changes smart and compelling. Making our FMC a royal with a less-than-genius twin was cheeky. I particularly liked the change to two nations at war with legitimate stakes and people at risk. Everything felt less genocidal and more realistic. Even the change to making the “good guys” be a nation with a monarchy versus the “bad guys” be more of a democracy was such a fun way to subvert the original text and how “pure bloods” were viewed. I particularly enjoyed our main villain being changed to a woman. It adds a layer of complexity to the auction itself.

It’s clear to me that every change was carefully thought through and dissected before moving forward. I think the real power in Soto’s world building though is the creation of two separate magic systems. THIS is what the fanfic was missing. The justification for the auction itself felt very hand-wavy in the fic, but in Rose in Chains, Soto has created two systems of magic where one can draw upon the magic of another. It creates purpose to why these people are slaves and raises the stakes. I’m also looking forward to exploring more with the familiars in the future books since that is a completely new element in RiC.

But let’s talk about our MMC shall we. Toven Toven Toven!!! Julie Soto understandings YEARNING y’all. In fact Toven yearns so hard that I worry Briony is a moron. The flashbacks are perfect and really builds up the fact that these two people are crushing HARD on each other and have been for sometime. Toven is way more explicit in his compliments than Draco ever was. I hate where we leave things at the end, but I’m patient. I can wait. If this follows the arc of the fic, then book two is gonna be SPICY.

Now to things I didn’t like. Very few honestly. I’d say the big two are her father and the big Rory reveal at the end. It made me so sad how discarded she was to her father. I mean I literally gasped when they were fleeing the school and she was just left behind. I don’t understand this writing decision, but I also don’t buy that Briony is some simpering woman willing to do whatever her father says, even if that means selling her off as a bride. I’m sure there’s intention here, I just didn’t enjoy it. Lastly…Rory. I fear I need him dead in my head. This is a MASSIVE pivot from the fic. Obviously it’s left in a very cliffhanger manner, so I don’t think I’ll be satisfied until book two, but mentally I’m struggle that the boy who lived…lives.

I am so sorry but I did not like the narrator for this story. Now to preface this I don’t listen to a lot of audiobooks that are not dual narrated. Also this is the first time I have heard the narrator Ella Lynch. It’s just…. I was bored. The plot of this book is a Evermore Princess, named Briony, is capture in the siege of her castle. Briony is stripped of her magic and sold to the highest bidder. She is sold to Toven Hearst of a rival family, known for their cruelty. Toven was also a boy from her past. And Briony must decides if she can trust Toven as she fight to escape and secure her freedom….. that sounds AWESOME. Like so amazing however with this narrator I was bored. All the male characters she voiced sounded like Licus Malfoy from Harry Potter. And yes I know this is based off the Hermione/Draco fanfic “the Auction”. However every male character doesn’t need to sound like a text book evil English wizard stereotype. The first time Briony mentions Toven, no matter what their relationship is at the time, it should have sounded like she was doing more than talking about the weather. No passion in it whatever so ever. That’s a huge moment in a romance book. This is one of the characters I’m going to support this whole story and his first mention gave NOTHING. It took me some time to even figure out he was the MMC because of how passive it was. And what really kills me is I LOVE Julie Soto. Im a huge Reylo fan and have read all her work. Im no stranger to fanfic or fanfic becoming books. I think her writing is incredible. When the actually book drops I’m going to read it myself because with the plot of this book being that good I need to see if reading it myself does it justice.

A phenomenal read. Everything I crave in a fantasy romance. This is true romantasy at its finest.

I hadn’t read Julie Soto’s previous work but after devouring Rose in Chains in a single day, I know I’ll be reading everything she writes. This book pulled me in completely with its raw emotion, sharp tension, and beautifully layered characters. The romance was breathtaking in that aching, addictive way that makes you forget the world around you.

When it ended, I wasn’t ready to let go. I needed more. Still do.

Thank you to the book gods that approved my NetGalley request to listen to this one early! Thank you to the publisher and author for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book was amazing. I loved the story, I love the magic system and I loved the love story. It had just the right amount of all everything! This book has got to be the next big one because it was just that freakin good!!

It’s definitely got its darker scenes and moments, so definitely check the trigger warnings!

Book review: One person shouldn't be able to be this talented. The world building was well done, the beginning didn't lag like some fantasy books do. The story had me hooked right away. I have a lot of questions and can't wait for the next installment. I will be buying a physical copy to reread obsessively until then.

Audio review: Ella Lynch was a fantastic narrator. She seemingly created the world with ease and it was really immersive.

I both enjoyed this book and feel conflicted about it. The characters were interesting, the magic system was unique, and I enjoyed the writing. However, the main plot of Briony and other women from her kingdom being auctioned off as property after it's overrun just gave me the ICK so hard, and I never really got over it. In my opinion, there wasn't enough world-building or reasoning given (however twisted) to try to explain why the auction exists and what its purpose was. I also just had such a hard time imagining these people who used to be schoolmates and work on class projects together now just treating Briony and the Eversuns so inhumanely. Because of this, it felt like it existed simply as a shock factor and made so many parts of the story overly sexual and creepy.

Toven was a confusing love interest, and I still haven't decided if I fully like him yet. Don't get me wrong, I like a morally grey man, but most of his actions and words felt too obvious. There were so many times when he was clearly longing after her and chose to say something horrible and pointed at Briony's weakest points. This routine started to feel a little repetitive by the end of the book, and I wish we had gotten to see their feelings and actions toward each other evolve a little more by the end. I definitely liked his softer moments, but he always managed to find a way to ruin it.

I have to admit that despite my feelings about the concept of the auction in this book, it did hold my attention, and I was curious to find out where things were going. I feel like the auction sort of stole the show in this first book in the series, and I really hope that in the next book, we start to see some more questions answered about the divide between kingdoms, the auction, and which side many of the characters actually stand on.

I really enjoyed being immersed in this world and the audiobook was a delight. As a Harry Potter fan it was very easy to see the parallels. However. I have never read the auction so this was a new story to me. I thought the narrator did an amazing job of making me feel like I was living in the book. My only negative is that the story felt incomplete. I know this is book 1 and my thoughts may change with book 2 but it felt like as soon as everything started going it ended. Definitely left me wanting more which is what you want from the start of a trilogy. I think Dramione fans as well as those that have never read HP will fall in love with Soto’s new world

I started eyeball reading this book and when I got accepted for the audio I switched to listening and I sadly could not do it!! I already had all the voices in my head so could not continue. But I’ve heard great things about the narration!!

Let’s start with that ending! That was a surprise epilogue I was NOT expecting, and it has solidified the fact that I will read book 2 when comes out in the future.

If I’m being honest I think I would have enjoyed this book more if I hadn’t known that its origin was as a Dramione fanfiction. I am absolutely against any support of JKR so the fact this was advertised using her characters, had me coming in questioning if I should even read it. I kept drawing comparisons to how this would have read as a fanfic, and I feel like that took me out of the story a fair bit.

Overall I definitely think it’s a solid book, the plot is interesting, despite a few holes, and the slow burn is slowwwwwww. I did enjoy seeing where that burn started. I’m interested to see where the story ends, especially with the way it ended.

Thank you to Netgalley and Hachette Audio for the ALC of Rose in Chains. I really enjoyed the quality of the narration, and I loved Ella Lynch’s voices. The audiobook kept my attention easily as well. I do think personally it was a little slow, but nothing a cheeky 1.25x speed couldn’t fix.

4/5 stars 🌟 🌟 🌟🌟
1/5 Spice 🌶

Firstly, thank you, Hachette Audio, Forever & NetGalley for the advance reader audiobook. This was my first book by Julie Soto & most certainly not my last.
Secondly, please read the trigger warnings before starting this book. They 100% necessary on this one.

Let's start with what I liked about this book. The magic system, while nothing earth shattering, was enjoyable and well developed. Our main character, Briony, was easy to relate to & be inside her head. While she needs practice & training in her magic, she has a lot of potential for growth. The mmc, Toven, was everything I wanted from a mmc: broody, morally grey, mysterious, possessive of his girl. While the spice in this book was low, there was a lot of angst & build-up for what will hopefully be coming in book 2. I love a good slow burn. The ending was a good amount of cliffhanger to make me want to continue the series, but not in a frustrating way. Ella Lynch did an excellent job with the narration. Her voice was easy to listen to & not at all distracting.

On to what I feel could've been better. Pacing is a bit uneven. The book starts you in the middle of an action scene, where our fmc loses her position as royalty, is imprisoned by the enemy & awaiting her own auction. However, the middle takes a long time to explain the magic system, building the world, and introducing too many characters to keep up with, without enough action in between. By the last 20%, the plot really takes off again. This story is told in the present, but shifts nearly every other chapter to the past (4 years back). I found it a bit hard to follow with the time shifts giving me whiplash.

Will I be reading book 2 when it comes out? Absolutely! I feel this book was a good setup for what's to come in book 2.


Tropes:
Enemies to Lovers
Forced Proximity
Touch her & die
Slooooooow burn
Mysterious mmc
Powerful fmc

Really sad I didn’t enjoy this and had to DNF at about 35% as I had such high hopes for it.

I’m still very grateful to have been given an early copy for review.

Sadly I don’t think this stand on its own without the fanfic background and lore as the author does very little of their own world building or set up their magic system to invest you in to the story. It’s incredibly slow.
If you stripped away away all the preconceived potter thoughts of the characters you are left with the very bare bones of a story

I didn’t feel connected to any of the characters and considering there are dark themes in this book they’re not adequately explored (until the point I read up to anyway). There should be very traumatic and complex emotions surrounding certain topics like forced sterilisation and threat of/ anticipated non consensual sexual acts but they’re all just kind of washed over and barely given any thought.

The constant timeline skipping made it really difficult to settle in the story too.

I wanted to love Rose in Chains, but it left me disappointed and exhausted. This was my third Julie Soto book, and, unfortunately, likely my last—her writing just doesn’t land for me.

The premise had promise: a post-war fantasy world, a heroine sold to a man she's long pined for, political intrigue, and repressed longing. But the execution? Flat. Briony, our heroine, felt like a passive observer to her own story—naive, repetitive, and hard to root for. Toven, the male lead, had all the ingredients of a brooding romantic hero but lacked believable motivation or emotional depth. Their romance, which should’ve burned with tension, felt lukewarm and hollow.

The pacing dragged. Flashbacks interrupted the narrative flow without adding real emotional weight. Much of the story felt stagnant—Briony moping in captivity while very little happened. I kept hoping for momentum, but even when things finally picked up near the end, it was too late to care.

Worldbuilding was another sore spot: lots of names and kingdoms thrown at the reader, few of which ever felt meaningful. The political backdrop served more as vague set dressing than integral plot.

One bright spot? The audiobook narrator. She brought far more life to these characters than the text ever did. Her performance made the story more bearable in audio format.

This was fantastic. The narration was amazing and very immersive. THE SLOWEST OF SLOW BURNS. I wish they would have given us more at the dinners Briony was forced to attend. That's what would've made this a 6 star read for me. It was a bit too slow of a burn. But overall, amazing tension, longing and plot. One of my new favorites.

The world in this book really captivated me. I loved the world building and the magic system. There is a slow burn romance but that is not the focus of the book. I think if I was more into Dramione fanfiction this story would have pulled me in more.
The narration in this audiobook was done by Ella Lynch. She did a really great job voicing the story. I loved her tone and pacing of the story.

I would give this book 6 stars if i were able too. Julie Soto totally knocked this would out of the park. The relationship between Toven and Briony is exactly what you want in a romantasy - they hate each other but pine in private.

I thought the world building, the magic system and the character development was something to just fall and just immerse yourself into.

As we know it is a rewrite of The Auction , but it is its own story- although it is still Dramionie coded. That being said, every change that was made , I believe made the story 1000 times better and I loved it even more.

It is a slow born story, with minimal spicey content noted throughout the story. maybe 2.5 🌶, and I would like to note - trigger warnings should be read ahead of time.

It is a very well written romantasy novel, but may not be for you if you have certain triggers. Triggers Warnings are listed on the first page.

The Narrator Ella Lynch is British, which I thought she was wonderful, and really brought the story to life. She read at a pace where I only had to speed it up to 1.2x vs my normal speed up to 2x and the British accent was EVERYTHING to this story.

tropes including :
*touch her and die
*enemies to lovers
*slow burn
*dual timeline

Overall I couldn’t put this book down - I really enjoyed the story in spite of the writing, which I found to be a little underwhelming.

What I enjoyed: while this wasn’t a direct copy of The Auction, it was still heavily Dramione-coded, taking some elements of Harry Potter fanfic but really creating its own world, magic, and characters. I was pulled into the story quickly and am already looking forward to books two and three. While Briony herself wasn’t my favorite, I loved a lot of the others and feel confident there are going to be some great character arcs developing over the series (e.g., Toven’s entire family, Larissa, Finn, even the enemies you love to hate).

Where I wanted more: my biggest issue was with how Briony comes across - naive to a fault. I realize it is often a stylistic choice to help bring the reader along, but in this case it was at odds with who they claimed Briony to be (I.e., it’s hard to believe she is the smartest in her class when she was so obtuse/naive/childish). I also thought the first ~30% of the book was a bit rough to jump into (not a lot of world building, a lot of characters that aren’t fleshed out, writing was more telling than showing).

Finally, I read and listened to this as an audiobook. As I mentioned above, the intro was a bit jerky, thus making it a bit hard to follow via audio (but still doable). Other than that, if you like audio books it’s a good one to pick. The narrator was British which was a delightful yet subtle nod to the fanfic origins. She does a good job bringing the story to life without adding unnecessary emotion (e.g., it would be easy to make Briony come across more whiny for a lot of her conversations and internal dialog but that didn’t happen).

Thank you to Julie Soto, Forever Publishing, Hachette audio, and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced listener copy in exchange for an honest review.

My freaking goddess, this book! I am new to the Dramione world, and while I don’t condone the insanity that JKR promotes, it’s hard to deny the pull of this couple…

Yall, Julie Soto slid so seamlessly into fantasy world building, I would NEVER had assumed she was a contemporary romance writer. This book starts off with a bang and does not. Let. Up. It hit all the right boxes for me: good pace, easy to understand world, slow burn, complicated morality, and a little magic thrown in.

Given Soto’s previous books, I was surprised by the low spicy level, but I imagine book 2 might have more…

The narrator was excellent, too. She nailed it!

Thank you to Hachette Audio ans NetGalley for this ALC! It was such a treat to experience this book in audio format. Can’t wait to read it with my eyeballs when it releases!!

Advance Listener Copy Review, thank you NetGalley, Julie Soto, and Hachette Audio!

Rose in Chains by Julie Soto
Narrated by Ella Lynch
Duration: 16h01m

Rose in Chains follows two opposing wizarding groups, the Eversuns and the Bormardi. The Bormardi have won the war, resulting in the Eversun women being auctioned off, including Briony, the Princess of the Eversuns.

This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year, so getting the chance to review it was an absolute highlight.

The first 15% is heavy on exposition, introducing a lot of characters, locations, and the magic system. If you’re unfamiliar with the origins of this story (iykyk), it might take a bit longer to follow this, feel fully immersed and could risk the potential of being a little confusing.

I loved the use of flashbacks to build the world and give deeper context to Briony and Toven’s relationship. These glimpses into the past reveal hidden motivations and emotions that tie beautifully back into the present day narrative, adding extra layers to the story.

This is truly the slowest of burns, with so much sexual tension, which made the eventual payoff even more satisfying. Without spoiling anything: it might just be the slowest burn I’ve ever read (and I mean that in the best way)!

The pacing and plot felt solid throughout, though I will say it gave off strong ‘book one of a trilogy’ vibes (which it is). The ending definitely left me shook and had me wanting more.

Just a heads-up: while this is marketed as romantasy, the tone leans quite dark. Definitely something to keep in mind depending on your preferences.

I listened to the audiobook version and, at first, wasn’t sure how I felt about the solo narration. I’ve become so used to dual-narration formats that it threw me off. But Ella Lynch captured the essence of the story really well and ended up being a delight to listen to.

Tropes:
~ Enemies to lovers
~ Dark Fantasy
~ Forced Proximity (Captivity)
~ Past and present timeline
~ Slow burn

I loved reading this book. It is a true slow burn where you know both characters are yearning for each other so you become invested in their relationship. Julie Soto writes stories so well that you don’t want to stop until the book is completed.