Glow by Raven Kennedy

"I was nothing but a road to Midas. A means to get to where he wanted to go, and I paved that path in gold."

My life has been made up of gilded lies. But death has been shaped from rot.

Like a phoenix caught fire, I will need to rise from the ashes and learn to wield my own power. Because my wings may have been clipped, but I am not in a cage, and I'm finally free to fly from the frozen kingdoms I've been kept in.

Yet the world doesn't want to let me.

That's the thing when you turn against a king—everyone else turns against you.

Good thing I have a different king in my corner.

But even with the dark threat of Slade Ravinger, the other monarchs are coming for me.

So I will fight for him and he will kill for me, and if we need to become the villains, then so be it.

Because so long as I live in this world, I won't be used again.

Well, that was one of the most disappointing continuations of the series. I just can't fathom why there are so many pages for how little happened in this book. I've seen the author's post stating that there will now be six books in the series because she didn't want to cut scenes out of book five. It's a shame, because Glow needed some good editing.

I had a real issue with the pacing of the book. Almost nothing happened for almost the whole book (till 87%, are you for real?). And at that point, I was so tired of all the flashbacks, needless sex scenes, and the repetition of the same things over and over again that I just skim-read the last 100 pages.

I don't like Slade in this book. I do not understand half of the things he does. Why does he need to be king and commander of the army pretending to be two different people? Especially when his brother can't live his life and is there just to be a Fake Rip? Why do they only notice that there is so much wrong with this when Auren points it out? And the funniest thing - it gets resolved so quickly. Slade just issues an order that Ryatt is now in command of the army. That's it. And everyone supports that, even his own army, who has no idea who Ryatt is and why he's suddenly leading the army. But that doesn't even matter because as soon as there is some problem with Auren (she needs time to rest, gets trained, goes on a tour of the Fourth Kingdom, gets kidnapped), they forget all about their kingdom and leave it to I don't even know who.

I also have so many questions about Slade's decisions. He's ready to starve his own people just because he doesn't want to send Auren to trial. I just... He was supposed to be this scary king, who is intimidating not only on the battlefield but also in all things political, but we don't see that at all. He decides that it's a great idea to just ignore other kings and queens when the price of that is the starvation of his own people. Is that a good king in the author's mind? I just can't deal with this.

I was eager to see that trial. I had such high hopes that Slade would be there to help Auren come into her power and guide her in all this political intrigue. Instead, anytime Auren wants to talk with him, he just fucks her brains out and tells her don't worry about people starving on her behalf.

There are also some other POVs. I didn't really care about them and have no idea why they were needed at all.

I don't know if there is any reason for me to continue with this series at all. Disappointment.

Actual rating; 4,5

Honestly this book felt longer then was necessary but oh my god this ending!!!!

Also, I really appreciate Aurens growth trough this book. I loved how she went from grieving to being a true bad bitch and I'm here for it

Not me thinking that this series was finished already. Now I have to wait till the end of the year to finish this?? Sigh.

Some parts we're slow it reminded me a lot of ACOTAR, training and Auren getting stronger. But the last 20% was the best. Very fast paced and had me wanting more at the end. Great ending.