Couldn't get into the story. Thought it was going to be set up differently. Sorry Did Not Finish.

In an alternate version of England there are the “Equals”, people with magical powers, passed through their families who are the controlling government, and the regular humans who are forced at some point in their life to serve 10 years of “slave days”. Abi has just finished high school and she’s been accepted to many medical schools, but she finds an opportunity that may be too good to miss. She can start her slave days now, directly serving one of the Equal families on their estate, where there are positions for her parents and siblings to join her. This way they can all serve together and live well, instead of taking their slave days in one of the brutal slavetowns.

But things don’t go according to plan, her brother Luke ends up separated from them, and her family may be in even more danger working for the Jardine family than if they were in the slavetown.

I’m a bit torn with this book, because while I was completely hooked by the end, I didn’t really buy into this world. I had a hard time accepting the whole slave days concept. 10 years seems so extreme for people to willingly give up their freedoms to serve the Equals in a modern day type society. I think this concept kept hanging me up. Yes, the equals are powerful and it’s a system that’s always been in place, but with modern technology it’s so much easier for people to communicate and gather in masses to protest, especially against the harsh conditions in the slave towns, which I guess the story does begin to focus on. But forcing myself to sort of let go of this idea, I was able to enjoy the rest of the book.

There’s a rebellion, there’s mind control and a tiny smidge of romance, and some political stuff amongst The Equals. There are a lot of different characters with alternating agendas and different abilities so there is a lot going on that makes the book fly by. The ending also leaves a lot of threads to be explored in the next book which I’m looking forward to reading.

An empty birdcage with the door shut. A tulip in its prime, upright in the vase but drab and gray, as if a week dead. A sheet ruled with musical staves but without notes. A violin with no strings.

* * *
3/5

Gilded Cage was a fun read, or as fun as a book about slavery and oppression can be. The writing was plain and the concept behind it was simple: there are the Equals, the nobility with magic-based powers called the Skill, and then there is everyone else. Normal people are second-class citizens who must serve their "slavedays", ten years of labour either in service to a house of Equals or in a slavetown, in order to gain their full rights. This all made it reasonably easy to follow; Gilded Cage is built on a decent idea executed in a satisfactory fashion. I devoured it in three days.

As I have said, the concept was all quite interesting. It primarily focuses on a family: Luke who is sent to Millmoor, a slavetown, and his siblings Abigail and Daisy who go to Kyneston estate alongside their parents to serve under the most powerful family in England, the Jardines. The Lord Jardine is frankly revolting and James conveys this very well. He has three sons: Gavar the heir who treats slaves and women like possessions is equally so, but is also rather interesting in his burning hatred of his father; Jenner, the middle son, Skill-less and kinder than his brothers; Silyen, politically ambitious and slippery as a snake. They are all decent characters with their own interesting motivations.

"The whole point about birthrights, Gavar thought resentfully, and not for the first time, was that they came to you automatically. You didn't have to do anything, except be who you were."

My favourite bits of the novel were the political scenes: I love deception and deviousness. I liked Bouda Matravers angling for power in a male-dominated game, I enjoyed the sister who wasn't all that she seemed. The setting and history were also well-fleshed out; a problem I have encountered with a number of books lately, which Gilded Cage did not suffer from, was a lack of sufficient world building and explanation. Gilded Cage never info-dumped but neither was I ever confused.

"It's an ability, origin unknown, manifesting in a very small fraction of the population and passed down through our bloodlines. Some talents are universal, such as restoration. Others, such as alteration, persuasion, perception, and infliction, manifest in differing degrees from person to person."

What prevents Gilded Cage from obtaining a higher rating, in my opinion, is that its focus is too large and its length too small. The novel focuses on Luke and his revolution at Millmoor, on Abi and her family at Kyneston, on Bouda Matravers and her political ambitions, on Gavar Jardine and his relationships with his father, brothers, and daughter, and on Silyen Jardine and his sneaky plots. The result is that none of these characters and their respective plots and arcs get enough pagetime. None of them are fully explored as they deserved - and Vic James has crafted several wonderful characters that don't rise to their full potential. If you want to write a book with multitudinous plotlines and focuses, then you have to write a hefty tome like A Game of Thrones. Not a slim volume like Gilded Cage.

"In the centuries since the Great Demonstration, no woman had ever sat there. Bouda intended to be the first."

I wanted to know all about the dynamics in Luke's group at Millmoor. I wanted to see more of Renie and the others, all the details of their missions and heists being pulled off. Or Bouda shifting her way up the political ladder, making distasteful deals and being all-round crafty. A novel focused on Silyen and Bouda as twin perspectives would have made a wonderful version of Gilded Cage with an emphasis on political intrigue. But alas. Gilded Cage wanders between being about the perils of revolution and its cost of personal sacrifice (Luke reminds me of Katniss Everdeen - someone caught up in the thrill of the revolution, willing to sacrifice themselves, but only just realising that what is so much harder is to ask and to watch as other people sacrifice their lives for your cause), between being a novel about family and familial love, and a novel about politics and the climb to power. They are all lovely ideas that are sketched out in Gilded Cage; if it had chosen and focused on one of these, it would have been far more compelling.

I was also not a fan of the romance. At one point I thought James was going to make a nicely illustrated point about how even if your oppressor and owner is kind, there cannot possibly be an equal relationship. No matter how kind a man is, he is still a Jardine and complicit in his family's crimes. Instead James writes a barely explored master/slave dynamic. Not really my thing at all. The good bit is it isn't particularly prominent.

"Well, that was unexpected." The Equal smiled. "I love it when people aren't who they seem. It makes life so much more exciting, don't you think?"

And Silyen. What an un-excavated goldmine! Silyen in the novel was fascinating and sly. But he simply did not get enough page time. Silyen is the youngest of the Jardine brothers, powerful in the Skill and slippery as an eel. He's the kind of character that readers love: smooth-talking, powerful, weaving a dozen plots at a time. You know the kind - he's the Kaz Brekker (Six of Crows) of Gilden Cage and he is criminally un-utilised. I'm hoping for a lot more Silyen in the next book, alongside more of the political weaving and double-crossing that I loved about Gilded Cage.

"She shouldn't have expected any better from Silyen Jardine, with his weird, bright friendliness and his utter lack of scruples"

I did love that the book was set in England. There's the whole parallels with British aristocracy to utilise, and James made nice use of our parliament system and the House of Lords/Peers. I'm going to presume that Vic James is English because there was a couple of nice references to British culture - Angel being named after the Angel in the North, and Gavar choosing to study Land Economy at university. I found that hilarious!

"Bouda had been the star Law student of their year at Oxford. It was one of the reasons Gavar had opted to study Land Economy instead - although "study" was perhaps an overstatement"

Land Economy has a reputation for being something taken by athletic students hoping to coast through academically (whether this is actually true or not I have no idea). Although I don't believe Land Economy can be studied at Oxford, only Cambridge.

The ending was also fantastic. The last 15% of the book is what I wish all of it had been: fast-paced, emotion inducing, full of plot twists. Abi finally grew her backbone. Luke faced the consequences of revolution. Silyen is sneaky. James finished the book with a bang that has left me anticipating the sequel. The ending, the characters, and the hope that James will write a more focused sequel, alongside the fact that it was genuinely fun to read, means this book is a solid 3/5 stars.

My thanks to Netgalley and the author for an ARC copy of Gilded Cage.

I honestly wasn't sure what to expect going into The Gilded Cage. It sounded like an awesome premise, but unfortunately what sounds like a good idea in the description sometimes falls flat in the actual story. I'm happy to say that The Gilded Cage absolutely did not disappoint. I reeeeaaaallllllyyyy liked this book. A lot.

This book is set in an alternative version of our world. In this world, England is split into two groups: those who are "skilled" (born with supernatural powers) and those who are not. The skilled rule, while the rest of the country is forced to spend ten years of their lives as slaves.

First off, as I already mentioned, I loved this idea a lot right from the start. I'll admit, I'm a sucker for a good dystopian book. But this is so much more than your steroptypical young adult dystopia. The Gilded Cage raises some interesting, and sometimes disturbing, ideas about the human race. But it doesn't feel preachy, or like it's trying to shove a particular belief down the reader's throats. The ideas are there, and the reader has to option to interpret them however they want.

The characters are pretty great too. I really enjoyed pretty much everyone, with a few exceptions. Each character had their own unique personality and backstory. Abi and Silyen are two of my favorites, but there are many more I loved too. It was easy to get attached to these characters and I was so invested in what would happen to them.

I do wish a few things would have been explained better, and there were times when I felt like the world building was a little lacking. There's definitely a lot more that needs to be explored in the future books. But, the stuff that was in the book was really cool!

I would definitely recommend this book. And I'm really excited to see where Vic James takes the story next!

Powerful, dark, memorable. Magic-wielding Equals rule over magicless Commoners with an iron fist. Any hint of rebellion is put down speedily and sometimes bloodily. The players:

The Hadleys, Commoner siblings:
Abi: The nurturing eldest sister; she requests that the family do their ten years at Kyneston, mistakenly believing it will be easy duty

Luke: Gets separated from the family and sent to the worst location, Millmoor, where he gets involved with rebels

Daisy: Preteen nursemaid to Gavar's bastard daughter, Libby, she hero-worships Gavar.

The Jardine brothers, a Founding Family
Gavar: Reluctant heir with an unpredictable temper; casual murderer of Leah, Libby's mother and Bouda 's reluctant fiance.

Silyen: Amoral Machiavellian puppeteer playing a long game, he offers no favors without gaining at least two in return. If this were The Game of Thrones, my money would be on him.

Jenner: The non-magic, sweet brother, with a forbidden tendre for Abi.

Remember when I said this is dark? The Commoners never get a break in The Gilded Cage. The Equals are immensely powerful, and they don't hesitate to use their magical gifts to slap down the slightest hint of rebellion. You'll find yourself cheering for the rebels early on, but it was frustrating because they were constantly on the losing end. We can only hope that things improve for them in the next book.

The world building in this story was so well done that it was easy to visualize everything from the streets in Millmoor to the kennels where Dog was so inhumanely kept. This series deserves to make the leap to the big screen one day.

First, I think that's an awful cover. Despite that, I still thought the book's premise sounded really promising. It sounded like there was going to be some star-crossed lovers, a revolution from the lower class, and a mysteriously powerful, game-changing person. And the book had all of that, but it all just felt so...bland. I didn't really care about the characters--I feel like I wasn't given a reason to care about them. Even though we get to see the story from both Abi and Luke's perspectives, I don't feel like I know who they are or what they care about or mostly WHY they care about what they do. I mean, obviously they care about their family, but is that their only motivation to do anything? I don't know how to explain it...I just didn't feel a connection there.

The romances and general relationships between characters were strange too. Honestly, it feels like the younger sister has been hypnotized or brainwashed or something. We saw no development in her relationship with the eldest brother (though not romantic in nature, still strange and slightly disturbing). The overall plot is hard to discern and may be more fleshed out in future books, but I'm not personally planning on continuing the series. Mostly I just feel confused. I don't understand how powers work or what they do (but I guess nobody really does). There's some weird generational explanation for some stuff, which didn't really make sense and just seemed super random and more confusing.

I've seen so much hype around this book, but it seriously let me down. I didn't hate it, but the story just felt so uninspired and flat. Too much happened with too little explanation. Despite such a great premise, I'm afraid I have to recommend that you give this one a hard pass.

Overall Rating: 3
Language: Mild
Violence: Heavy
Smoking/Drinking: Moderate
Sexual Content: Mild

Note: I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This would be one of those books where the Goodreads summary's addition of these words drew my attention: For readers of Victoria Aveyard...

Okay I've read ONE book of hers. And liked it enough that I intend to catch the others in the series eventually. So I thought, sure, why not?

The cover didn't pull me in as I generally have a habit of judging books by covers. The synopsis did. I found the first 50% of the book to be interesting but it was not overwhelming me. The part I could've camped out in the entire book about, is the story-lines following the three Jardine brothers. Equals...two of which have power and the youngest somehow was born with zero skill. He's no different than the ordinary commoner humans aside from his family name. Their stories alone would've sold me more on the book.

However, as it is, the book jumps around to different characters. Twenty-Five year old Gavar the oldest Jardine brother, Silyen the middle brother who likely has the most power of the siblings, Abi the oldest sibling of the human family sent to work their slave days out with the Jardines, Luke the middle sibling of Abi's family, and only brother who unfortunately gets separated by his family and is sent to work out his slave days in a slave town called Milmoor. Plus there are other POV's: Bouda comes to mind, Euterpe, and perhaps one or two more. Usually for me, with so many different POV jumps, I sometimes get bogged down. It's unlikely I will enjoy reading from each of these characters. I found that to be the case for me with this story as well. I found Luke's story line to be much more political in nature. Though there's definitely a lot of politics going on with Bouda as well....engaged to the eldest Jardine brother for none other than the power his name will bring to her as she is climbing the proverbial political ladder to be a chancellor: the first female chancellor.

Basically the story is about those with skill, who are called Equals, wanting to rule over those without, the common folk. Skill is an ability which manifests itself in small numbers of the population and is passed down through bloodlines. Some of the skilled talents are healing, alteration, persuasion, perception, and infliction (such as pain). If you are born an ordinary human you have to give up 10 years of your life in service to either a skilled family or a slave town. Who can say if one is better off than the other? Both are slaves to someone else. The timing of your slave days is up to you. The older you are, the more brutal what's required of you can be. But the ordinary humans are tired of living this existence....and as such an uprising is brewing. However, most skilled think the situation is fine the way it has been for centuries and since most can cause damage just with their mind and even more can heal themselves, how on earth are they to be defeated?

Finally the end brought a couple of surprise twists and that piqued my interest.

There's not much in the way of a love story. That left me more on the meh side of this story overall. At this point I'm not so sure I would come back for book two.

Favorite Quote:
"Well allow me to offer a lesson of my own. I know you like history, Abigail. Remember: those who don't learn from it are doomed to repeat it. Or should that be those who learn from it are able to repeat it?"

Language Rating: 1 (light)
Mature Content Rating: 1 (light)
Final Rating: 3 stars

I am thoroughly impressed. This book gets all the stars from me. I'd give it more if I could.

You've got an interesting concept - two kinds of humans, Equals and the normal people. Equals have superhuman powers. Normal people are, well, normal. Every normal person is required at some point in their life to serve ten years of "slavedays," service to the Equals in some form or fashion.

You've got superpowers - instant hook for me - and they're not used on every page or constantly thrown about. We get glimpses of the power throughout, and it feels like a taste of what's to come...

You've got some great characters - a family divided, an infant with mysterious seeming lack of powers, some Equals very full of themselves, a creepy Equal with stranger powers than most, power hungry politicians and rebellious normals.

I don't want to give away too much -- but I will say this. I wasn't surprised at all by one of the biggest twists of the book. I had actually come to expect it a while before the reveal. But what happened AFTERWARDS did kind of throw me for a loop, and set up the next book extremely well.

Thankfully, the next book comes out later this year, and hopefully the wait for the third won't be too long, because as of right now, *GRABBY HANDS*

Special thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I think that this is a promising start for a series. This was not a perfect book by any means, nor was it wholly original. However I think that it had a few elements that will allow it to become a good series with time.

The first thing I did really like about it was the world. It was a classic power-filled dystopian with a slave class of people. Not exactly original but I appreciated that it felt like Vic James put a lot of effort into creating a centuries-old history for this futuristic England. That was clearly evident in certain scenes where there was an abundance of information given to readers.

I also liked two of the plethora of characters that we get points of views from. I really liked Luke, one of the main Hadley siblings. He had the most character growth throughout the series and I appreciated that he was moralistic and loyal.

I also liked Silyen because I'm a sucker for unapologetically chaotic neutral characters. Vic James never tried to pitch Silyen as other than he was. He was presented as a morally grey enigma and I liked that.

One of the things that I think hurt this book was that there were like seven characters who got points of views. I don't think all of them were necessary and I don't feel like it really served a purpose. Having that many character changes really removed me from the story and kept me from liking any of the other characters.

As far as the multitude of characters went, I literally only liked Luke and Silyen. I absolutely hated Abi. She was such a weak character. Her whole role in the story was being obsessed and in love with Jenner, who was a spineless and weak coward. Despite the fact that he never once stood up to his family, Abi didn't know how to not spend a single chapter gushing over him. I hated their romance. It was stupid and inappropriate considering we were romanticizing a relationship between a slave and her master. I'm really over female characters whose only characteristic is being obsessed with a man. I also hate how the strong and ambitious political woman is constantly referred to as a "bitch" by every one because we can't have strong females without them being bitchy. Nope, impossible.

I think this book could have been infinitely better if the romance had been removed and the characters were strengthened. However the cliffhanger has me interested to see where this story will go next.

* SPOILER ALERT *

I received the ARC copy 'Gilded Cage', Random House Publishing Group title from NetGalley! I felt really offended by slave/master outlook in this book. Like they chase after a slave on horseback or the family is staying in a cottage on the estate of one of The Skills family(basically slave masters). This book I couldn't even make it to chapter 10 I stopped at chapter 7. Maybe one day I'll read it again, but as of now NOT finishing this one.

The plot of Gilded Cage was slow to build, and the characters were slow to reveal themselves, but once the story took off I couldn't put it down. This unique dystopian/alternate history proposed questions and created situations that sparked my imagination and sense of outrage. I became invested in not only the family, but all of the commoners in their need for revolution. This novel comes at a crucial time in American history, and I believe it will be a beacon - and a mirror - in an uncertain time.

Did not finish. The genre and subject matter didn't end up appealing to me.

I was going through the upcoming releases when I saw that one in particular, Gilded Cage by Vic James, was getting a lot of buzz. After taking an initial look at it, I acquired an ARC from netgalley and decided that it was likely going to be a book I was supposed to enjoy more than I did. You know the type, something that is hyped as the next Game of Throne or Harry Potter, but never lives up to the sell. So I tossed my copy on my to-be-read pile and forgot about it for a month. I eventually decided I could use a break from fantasy with some historical fiction and maybe see if Gilded Cage might be ok, and then I promptly had to eat my words and feelings because it is pretty damn good.

I say it is a historical fiction, but I realized near the end that it is more akin to an urban fantasy (look a lot of people were on horses and I jumped to conclusions about time periods, it is the present. My track record with this book is embarrassing). The story is set in a present day London, but with a radically different world than ours. In the world of Gilded Cage, there are two groups of people; the skilled (called equals) and everyone else. The skilled are those who can perform magic, and it sets them above their fellow man. The skilled are treated differently in every society (some that we hear snippets of, such as Americans who hunted their into extinction) but in London they formed an aristocracy that rules over the land. In England, in order to keep the economy afloat, each unskilled must submit to ten years of slavery at the time of their choosing. Some do it young, some do it old, but they all do it. The slavery can take the form of anything from back breaking manual labor in the textile industry to being the butler or personal slave of a skilled. But no matter what the experience is horrible and usually changes the person for the worst. Our protagonists are two families, one skilled and one unskilled. The skilled family is one of the leading aristocratic families, with an older son who is a brute, a sweet middle son who is unskilled, and a strange youngest son Silyen who is quiet and eerie but is unprecedentedly skilled at… well, skill. The second family is a group just entering their slave days, some in a back breaking shanty town and some at the gilded palace of the Skilled. The plot follows several POVs in each family and what a plot it is.

The prologue of the book left me a little disappointed and made me think that the story was going to be a melodramatic sob story, but once again I misjudged it. Despite the upsetting topic of slavery, Vic James does a great job exploring the horrors of the subject without being too over the top. In addition, the skilled families are painted with a variety of personalities and shades of grey that make it both easy to hate some and hard to hate others. The book’s primary strength definitely resides in its characters, both main and support. Almost every character is well fleshed out and interesting, but for now I will focus on the three main POVs. Silyen, as mentioned before, is the youngest and most skilled of one of families. He is unhappy with the status quo of the world and dislikes that skilled live lives of luxury while the unskilled do labor - but not for the reason you would expect. See Silyen isn’t a romantic revolutionary - he is obsessed with the skill and feels that the equal’s slavelord status has keep skill from improving. Abi is the oldest child of the unskilled family and is helping protect her family in a skilled household and dig up secrets on their reclusive kind. Finally, Luke is the middle child of the unskilled family and has been shipped off to the machine shops in the worst part of the country. There he joins a revolution fighting against the equals. All their stories are fun, exciting, and filled with twists and intrigue. I really enjoyed the plot and am excited for more.

The only major cons in the book were that the ending felt a bit abrupt and that some of the details of the world could be fleshed out a bit more. The ending is a huge cliffhanger and it left me feeling like I didn’t quite get a full book. However, it certainly left me wanting more and it isn’t going to stop me from picking up the sequel as soon as possible. In addition, I felt it hard to understand the time period and state of the world occasionally and I wish that the same level of attention given to building out the cast was spent on their surroundings.

Other than these minor nit pickings, the Gilded Cage delivered a much better story than i could have imagined and is well on its way to earning a spot on my best of 2017, and it is only February. Vic James has created a fascinating new entry into the fantasy genre that is hard to classify, other than as good. The Quill to Live definitely recommends you learn from my mistake and pick up and read Gilded Cage with little delay.

Rating: 8.0/10

I enjoyed this book. While the beginning started of slow for me and had a major 'Hitler concentration camp' feel it definitely picked up quickly after the first 25%. The characters were well thought out and developed and the world was painted beautifully. I will say though I did find it rather easy to guess what was going to happen nearing the middle to end of the book.

I will most definitely be reading the second book in the series!

Check out my blog for the full review in a couple days. Brutalbookworm@blogspot.com

I was sort of interested in this story, but within the first few chapters there was a glaring plot hole. If anyone can delay their time as slaves, then why wouldn't they? If I could delay mine until I'm old and have already lived my life, then I would. Honestly, there would be a chance that death would happen before slavery even would start. From the sound of the slave towns, death would be preferable.

Also, why would any university take a student that hasn't received any education in ten years? They would have to be re-educated in all that they have forgotten and the newest technology.

DNF

Not all are free. Not all are equal. Not all will be saved.

Our world belongs to the Equals - aristocrats with magical gifts - and all commoners must serve them for ten years. But behind the gates of England's grandest estate lies a power that could break the world.

This story is told from 3 different perspectives; Abi's, Luke's and Silyen's. Abi is a servant to England's most powerful family, the Jardines in Kyneston, but her spirit is free. So when she falls for one of the noble-born sons, Abi faces a terrible choice Uncovering the family's secrets might win her liberty, but she might sacrifice love in return. Luke is Abi's brother and is serving is 10 years enslaved in a brutal factory town, Milmoor, after a mistake is made and he doesn't have a place in Kyneston with his family. Cruelly oppressed and far away from his family, he makes friends whose ideals could cost him everything. Now Luke has discovered there may be a power even greater than magic, revolution. Silyen is a Jarden and he is considered a shadow inn the world of the Equals, containing mysterious powers no one else understands. Will he be literate or destroy?

3.5 stars. I feel like I have read several YA fantasy books in the last year that kind of have some of the same themes. Obviously every book is different, but I feel that I have a read a lot of books where society is divided into the "elite" and the "commoners" and the "commoners" want to rebel against the "elite." Anyway, I did enjoy this book, but I have to admit I really only was interested in the chapters that were told from Abi and Silyen's perspective. I found Luke to just be a bit boring, even though what is happening in Milmoor when he is there, isn't boring at all, I just feel like I have kind of read the same story line before. There are a lot of parts of this story that I don't want to talk about because it will give away some of the plot that should remain unknown until reading the book. Abi's entire family ends up working for the Jardens, minus Luke, but her mother, father and younger sister Daisy are all working in different positions on the Jardin's estate. And Abi becomes involved with one of the Jardin sons, which further complicates things. I will say that the plot twist and the way the book ended was quite unexpected and will leave readers eagerly awaiting the second book in the series, due out this fall.

I think I would have enjoyed this book more if it was only told from 2 perspectives. There are only a few select books I have read where multiple perspectives of more then 2 people really worked, in my humble opinion. It makes you lose interest in certain characters when you go so many chapters in between reading from their perspective. I understand why the author did it in this book because of the multiple locations of characters and wanting the perspective of both a commoner and an Equal. I also felt that I didn't get to know the characters very well, which again is hard to do when you have multiple main characters you are trying to focus the story on. I just only felt like I really got invested in Abi and Silyen's characters and didn't really care that much about Luke's perspective or story. Overall, a well written book and I believe that fans of the Red Queen series and The Young Elites series will also enjoy this book.

Gilded Cage, being marketed as a fantasy despite really being more along the lines of a futuristic dystopia, has an interesting premise to draw in YA readers... but the actual story in these pages is somewhat less fascinating than promised and much more familiar than described (hello Red Queen vibes!). The worldbuilding in Vic James's version of England works in a "don't think about it or question anything too much" kind of a way, but the many conceits the story must take in order to faciliate the plot... well, it all ends up feeling very undeveloped or generic by the long anticipated ending.

The required suspension of disbelief to engage with the plot is encompassing, but the main problem with Gilded Cage is that it is just too long, too boring, and too dull. It feels like an exercise in making a 360-odd page novel feel like a 600-page behemoth. The strong points and new ideas that the novel does bring into play (like Jenner's unique family position, Bouda's pure ambition, the Milmoor kids in general) are often overshadowed or just plain lost in the underwhelming and long-running myriad of plots the book goes through. I seem to be the black sheep when it comes to this series opener, but I needed more depth in the world, and less superficiality on the part of the characters.

Because I cared so little about the people and the world they inhabited made so little sense, with little time or care taken to expanding either crucial element, there was not much for me to invest in for large sections of the story. The cast is also mostly white, which I found to be distasteful especially for a book that tackles slavery as both a societal theme and also as a fact of life for its characters. The story does pick up in pacing and plotting somewhat near the end of Gilded Cage, but for me, it was too little too late. The writing itself is serviceable, if nondescript, and I did find a small romance to help keep me reading here in book one, but I won't be continuing the series with Tarnished City.

Too Many POVs
Anyone who follows my blog knows how finicky I am when it comes to multiple point of views and this book is a prime example of what not to do. I understand it's written in third person. However, that does not give the author the option to jump around to whatever character they want.

Some characters got a substantial number of chapters while other characters got only one chapter. Perhaps I could've overlooked these single-chapter characters if they're POV had offered anything to the plot, but they didn't. It's because of the constant jumping and inconsistencies in POVs that I didn't connect with a single character in the story.

What plot?
I spent 60% of this book wondering 1) what the plot was and 2) what the heck was going on. There is no obvious plot in the entire first half of the book. Even when the plot did develop in the last quarter of the book (or more like the last two chapters), too much was left unexplained. So, not only was there no saving grace, but it didn't help that I didn't care about anyone or anything by this point.

Sub-par World Building
I am really disappointed in this book because it's fantasy and fantasy is known for it's extravagant and mesmerizing world building. Yet, this did not even come close. The only world building in this entire story was the magic and even that was poorly explained and skimmed over.

Time, that's a thing?
The timeline in this book is linear, but garbage. Large sections of time are just... skipped over! This only works if it's implemented into the story appropriately and done for a reason. However, the time jumps in this book did neither. They were just there and they were blatant and they were meant to act as a reason for the characters changing/growing, which it didn't because I never got to know the characters in the first place.