Book Review: Gleam (The Plated Prisoner #3) by Raven Kennedy

Rating: ★★★☆
Audience: Fantasy Romance
Length: 681 pages
Author: Raven Kennedy
Publisher: Self-Published
Release Date: May 31st, 2021
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

King Midas made me the woman I am today. Notorious. Unattainable. His.

The thing about being confined is that you believe it’s to keep the bad out… Until you realize it’s about keeping you in.

I’m now in a strange kingdom surrounded by liars, with no allies of my own, but I won’t sit idly by and let myself wither. No, there’s something that’s bloomed from the pit of my repression. Something dark. Something angry.

But the last thing I expected was for my anger to call out to him. King Ravinger.

He’s sinister and powerful and entirely too seductive. I’ve learned my lesson with trusting manipulative kings, so why does my chest constrict every time he’s near? I need to tread carefully, or I’m at risk of losing much more than just my freedom.

Regret and revenge war inside of me, and I need to figure out a plan fast before I get tangled up in the schemes of kings and queens.

Because I won’t be caught in a cage again. No, this time, It’ll be me setting the trap… I just hope my heart comes out of this unscathed.

I GUESS I’LL READ BOOK FOUR?

I held off on picking this one up as long as I could. Unpopular opinions flying out ya, you’ve been warned.

Nothing happens in this entire series for 90% of these books. The last 10% gets a bit wild, you feel called to pick up the next, but it’s the same dang cycle. Auren spent most of this particular installment wandering around a castle looking for an old guard who I didn’t know she cared so much about?? I must be feeling cold-hearted, but I needed way more than that. Castle wandering is BORING. BO-RING.

I did like some stuff; namely Rip. The romantic development was good. Plenty of swoony conversations when Rip shows his feelings and his alpha nature is *chef’s kiss*. The steam was wayyy past my limits, but there wasn’t much of it (considering 700 pages) and is easy to skip by. If there had been even more just general interaction between Rip and Auren that would have raised this book.

At last, Auren finally used her power. So the ending was interesting and expected. I wasn’t flipping out (as I was told would happen) but I am genuinely curious how there’s supposed to be a book four? I’m sure there’s more wandering to be had. One can hope that Auren really does something next round.

Overall audience notes:

Fantasy Romance
Language: strong
Romance: two open door; high explicit
Violence: high
Trigger/Content Warnings: domestic abuse, rape (off page but alluded to), sexual assault, drug use, torture, weapons violence