Author: Marissa Meyer
Series: Gilded #2
Narrator: Rebecca Soler
Playback: 16hrs 28m
Publisher: MacMillan Audio
Genre: Fantasy, Retelling
Book Description: Before the Endless Moon, when the Erlking means to capture one of the seven gods and make a wish to return his lover, Perchta, from the underworld, Serilda and Gild attempt to break the curses that tether their spirits to Adalheid's haunted castle. But it soon becomes clear that the Erlking's hunger for vengeance won't be satisfied with a single wish, and his true intentions have the power to alter the mortal realm forever. Serilda and Gild must try to thwart his wicked plans, all while solving the mystery of Gild's forgotten name, freeing the ghosts kept in servitude to the dark ones, and trying to protect their unborn child.
Review:
This is YA romance story, so I should have known that it was a bad idea to continue with this series. With that said, I liked the world, the ancient gods, that sacrificed part of their magic to seal the dark ones under a veil. The fight between the dark ones and the gods, the fairy tale aspect, the ability to conjure the forgotten stories through "made believe" stories.
I LOVED many of the plot aspects as I mentioned before; my one complaint? The Main Character Serilda and her romance story.
Let me explain a bit. Serilda has reached the Erlking and now is trapped by him. They made a pact, she has married the King and they're play-acting to wanting to procreate. She is scared that the children will be punished if the truth is revealed, so she lets Gild think that the King is forcing her to engage in sexual activities with the intent of getting her pregnant. A lot of the struggle is her deciding of telling the Gilded ghost or not the truth.
The pacing of the story is very lacking. The first 25% was a very good stretch, except for Serilda's lame love acting, but the rest of the happenings in the castle made it bearable. Then the next fourth somewhere towards the middle of the book, it was an overly drawn out section. Nothing happens there, Meyer overdoes the descriptiveness even more than usual, and the writing is horrendously basic; so basic many "paragraphs" are one word or three words, no exaggeration. Had I not been listing to it in audio format I would have either heavily skimmed or simply DNF at this point.
Towards the end is where things start to happen plot-point-wise. We have the big reveal of what the Erlking really wants- to capture all the gods and not only to get a single wish but something much more. The consequences of the wish if granted- are Earth-ending for the rest of the creatures and humans alike. It was building up to probably be a good way, the stakes start to rise, but then it all crashes in the most unimaginative way possible.
The revelations near the finish line didn't sit well with me, and it seems even more unrealistic taking into consideration on Serilda's attitude up to this point in the story. She accepts rather too quickly and naturally, it does not make sense with who we have come to know about her. She hardly gives a token protest when such a revelation should've been more emotionally impactful given how deeply it affected her to have grown up motherless. She does not remember her mother and yet spent all of the story obsessed with finding her and finding out what happened to force her to abandon her husband and daughter.
Serilda doesn't grow as a character and doesn't mature, she's still the same talkative liar she was in the beginning, her character remains as shallow as ever. After everything that happened you would expect her to grow up, mature a little bit. Honestly, nobody grows as a character here! The Gilded ghost, the ancient gods, everyone is just the same as when the story started. It was a bit of a disappointment.
On the other hand, the reveal of the Rumpelstiltskin retelling was a good touch. But it was not enough to carry the whole book.
Unpopular opinion maybe but this did not have to be so long, heck- the whole story would have been finished in a single book that way it might have had less dragged-out scenes.
I am on the lookout for retellings, not giving up in Meyer yet, some of her books have not been this annoying for me, so I have hope of finding another gold nugget.
This was used for the challenges:
Series
#AYearAThon: Finish series
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