Golden

A twist on Goldilocks and the three bears where Auluria is Goldilocks and infiltrates the bears for her cousin who wants to bring them down. The premise is interesting and the writing and characters and plot all had a lot of potential. I think my only problem is the pacing and the buildup. You can't just start the book off with Auluria and Dov in love when they just met and she can't even remember who she is. You really have to build up to these things. Same thing with the society they live in that we're supposed to see as unfair. I think the author could've done so much better if she took her time and let things develop rather than jumping in head first for every change or any big thing we're introduced to. I will totally read the sequel though but I don't know if I'll stick with the series if the story telling doesn't improve. Who ever the editor is should really have made Robinson take more time to add details and let the plot unfold and to back up all the developments in the books so that it doesn't feel abrupt.

Who knew that a great classic could be turned into a high stakes adventure. Take Goldilocks and the Three Bears, put it in a jar, shake briskly, and you have the story Golden. 
In this clever adaptation,  Goldilocks is not innocently drawn to the Three bears cottage looking for good and rest. No she is much more. She has been sent in under cover to discover all the secrets of the, you guessed it, Baer family.
After discovering things aren't really as she has been taught to believe, she finds herself having to chose which side of the "fight" she will play in. Playing both sides of the game, may not end up how she planned. In a story such as this, you have to read to know how it ends. No spoiler alerts here. Howeve, I can say, this is very cleverly, and imaginatively written.
Definitely, 5 Stars!

I really liked this different take on such a classic story. There aren't enough good things I can say about it. I loved Dov and Auluria and basically everyone in the book. I even ended up liking shadoe. I will be anxiously waiting for the next book!

I LOVED THE STORY! AND OF COURSE I LOVED . . . SILAS. How could I not? he is honestly the best character in the ENTIRE story. Sorry Auluria and Dov! 

The storyline was intriguing and I liked the way the characters were introduced. A few places were a little too detailed for my taste. But what really brought it down to only three stars was the ending. The story went at a calm steady pace all the way through, until the end. It felt as if the end was in day forward but cut off before the end. I had to read it twice to try to understand where everyone stood. Perhaps my review would improve after reading the sequel but I didn't feel it had a conclusion that it should have.

I really enjoyed this book. I couldn't put it down as soon as I started reading it. This is what really happened to Goldie Locks and the 3 bears but in a real world scenario not actual bears. Everyone is trying to live as of course the Government is not making that easy at all. Baers and Auluria are both considered outsiders to the Government. They try and help other people like them. The bock was fast-passed. I was disappointed at the end ONLY because it was left with a cliff hanger. I look forward to the other 3 books in this series.

I really like the style this book was written by. It was written very well and i liked the way the character actions were written.

What I feel this book really could have benefitted from (and it still could benefit from) a prequel. Auluria was a pretty cool character and she had so much development that had happened before the start of the book with all the combat training etc. I for one love a combat training section to a book and I think it would have helped me, the reader, to better understand her motivations.

The book also feels at times as though it just needs a little bit of reworking. For instance, the book opens and Auluria is suffering from Amnesia and can’t remember how she came to be in the Baer household. I thought this was going to be a really cool plot device and that we’d spend the first half of the book discovering what the Baer’s were like and then suddenly she’d realise she was meant to betray them! Wouldn’t that have been epic? Instead, around two pages later her memory just restores itself. As I say this isn’t an utterly terrible opening, it just felt like a missed opportunity to me.

Now let’s talk about the romance. Dov was a pretty cool romantic interest, not particularly novel in any way. But what really struck me about this was the predictability of it all. By about twenty pages in I could work out exactly what was going to happen. There were also some wonderfully awkward romantic lines:

‘I couldn’t bear to see him shirtless again without staring’
-I hope to high heaven that this was a deliberate pun.

or the impeccable:

‘”Why do you care?” I asked softly, needing to know. “Because you are worth it,” he whispered’
-Is this a YA novel or a Loreal Advert?

As much as I could disparage this I will admit that it was an interesting take on the Goldilocks story. I think it could definitely become something interesting in the future, but perhaps needs a bit more editing to make it feel a bit more realistic (other than the fantasy elements) but particularly the romantic dialogue.

If you’re looking for a cosy young adult fantasy novel to read mindlessly while you’re falling asleep in the bath then you’ll probably enjoy Golden. I wasn’t planning on waiting for the second one and then Robinson left the juicy teaser that they’re going to explain how Auluria gets the nickname ‘Goldilocks’ in the next book which actually got me pretty interested again. Although if it transpires it’s just because she has gold hair I will be unsurprised but still disappointed.

My Rating:

I desperately wanted to like this more than I did. It just about scraped 3/5 stars. Enjoyable but not desperately noteworthy.

By the way: I received a digital review copy of Golden from the publisher (Snowy Wings Publishing) via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, all my opinions are my own.

This book was good but nothing stuck out to me particularly. I didn't bond with the characters as a reader, and the plot was okay,. it was a good retelling but not an amazing one.

The story itself was very interesting. The characters were believable and engaging. I found that the main character, Aurluria, was brainwashed into believing what her cousin said was true and never questioned him about his motives. Since he took care of her from a young age she was more susceptible to do his bidding until she met the Baer family. The emotions were deeply felt even her conflicting emotions. I did think that her amnesia could have last a bit longer than what it did, but it gave a chance for readers to understand what was going on.

this was an original and interesting idea for a goldilocks retelling, however i wasn't convinced by the amnesia plot device at the beginning and i didn't really see the point of it (view spoiler). i also thought it was pretty predictable and a typical YA dystopian, and the worldbuilding was lacking and seemed only to be a very vague backdrop to the narrative.

i might have liked this more if it was one of the first YA dystopians i'd read, but i'm used to the genre by now and there was nothing particularly new or original about it save the goldilocks retelling aspect, which was not enough to make the mediocre plot and characters engaging.

however, i wouldn't say it was a bad book and it was very action-filled, i'm just getting pickier and pickier (i guess that's one of the hazards of being a voracious reader; you're used to cliches and tropes of genres and unless something is really different and original i'll probably be underwhelmed)