Gilded Cage (The Dark Gifts Trilogy, #1)

by Vic James

From the bestselling author of Sanctuary comes a thrilling Orwellian vision of Britain, with a rebellious Hunger Games heart. Gilded Cage is the astonishing debut novel by Vic James, and the first title in her electrifying The Dark Gifts Trilogy.

A modern Britain.
An age-old cruelty.

Britain's magically skilled aristocracy compels all commoners to serve them for ten years – and now it's the Hadleys' turn. Abi Hadley is assigned to England's most ruthless noble family. The secrets she uncovers could win her freedom – or break her heart. Her brother Luke is enslaved in a brutal factory town, where new friends' ideals might cost him everything.

Then while the elite vie for power, a young aristocrat plots to remake the world with his dark gifts. As Britain moves from anger to defiance, all three must take sides. And the consequences of their choices will change everything, forever.

'A dark and intriguing vision of an alternate, magic-drenched Britain, Gilded Cage kept me up way into the night'– Aliette de Bodard, author of The House of Shattered Wings

Continue the fantasy series with Tarnished City and Bright Ruin.

• ISBN10: 1509821457
• ISBN13: 9781509821457
• Publish Date: 26 January 2017 (first published 1 December 2016)
• Publish Status: Active
• Out of Print: 11 November 2022
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan
• Imprint: Pan Books
• Format: Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
• Pages: 416
• Language: English

Reviews

[Terri M. LeBlanc]

I acquired Gilded Cage by Vic James at MidAmericon II last summer. I was thrilled to get an ARC, by chance, at the event and even more delighted when a few of my fellow bloggers started mentioning the book because I had picked up a copy months prior! I’m rarely ahead of book craze game so I was somewhat proud of myself for selecting a book that others were excited to read as well.

At the end of the Gilded Cage left me with too many questions.

What EXACTLY can the Equals do? Is Skill magic? Where does the power come from? Why do some people have Skill and others don’t? Because I got the distinct feeling that perhaps Skill can be transferred and/or manipulated by Skilled folks who have stronger powers than another.

What is the political game at foot here? Instead of love triangle, there is a political game triangle (maybe even a different shape happening) and it is confusing! Silyen, Bouda, Silyen’s father and his cronies, the Equals trying to bring justice to the Unequals/Slaves/Commoners (what were they called again?!)

What is the point to having so many points of view in such a short book?

Here’s the list: Leah (who only shows up once), Abi, Luke, Silyen, Gavar, Euterpe (who only shows up once), Bouda.

The multiple points of view muddled the story, created an incomplete picture. As a reader, I felt detached from the story. I spent most of my time struggling to get to know the characters and understand their motives, as well as figuring out the world and its rules. In the end I was angry at the rushed ending and confused about how the world worked.

Unfortunately, Gilded Cage is a mess. Told from way to many points of view, you never get a complete painting of the world, its political structure, its magical rules or what game is being played. There are two many players for a three hundred page young adult novel. This felt like a Song of Fire and Ice (aka The Game of Thrones) for kids, but less masterfully composed.
This review was originally posted on Second Run Reviews

[littleread1]

undecided. it was a good story but I just ... am not sure.

[ayla_abbott]

I'm pretty done with versions of the whole "elites with power or privilege enslaving the pleebs till some teenagers decide to do something about it" plot, but even though I was ready to walk away a few times I continued to the end and have to admit that it's a pretty good example of the premise. I'm not sure I'll read the next, but I'm glad there were surprises in there. I REALLY like that the characters, especially in the central Equal family are complex with opaque motives; I don't feel like I know how any of them are going to turn out, and so maybe I will keep reading after all.

[layawaydragon]

Trigger Warning: “Slave Days”, Violence, Mindfucking, Pyscho White People, Torture, Naked Guy Trained as a Dog + Kept On A Leash, (but there’s only light kissing so prudes don’t worry!!)

What can I say? Don’t read this. Don’t get sucked into another fantasyland with an allegory for racism and literal “slave days” that people VOTED for?!? Okay, just don’t…

I was very close to DNF’ing the book. It was obvious, cliche, bunch of stupid white people running around, reeked of privilege, stupid crushes, etc.

Just every terrible thing you’ve heard about YA Dystopian and Paranormal books, especially the clueless privilege.

And then the rebellion kicked in and the politics got deeper and characters got interesting and I kept reading til the damn end.

I am so disappointed with myself over it. So much wasting time and energy spent on this and I just do not have anything nice to say about it all.

Will I continue the series? No. I still don’t recommend it. I should have quit while I was ahead instead of falling into such a stupid, annoying, problematic POS.

*sigh*

[wyvernfriend]

absolute power would corrupt absolutely. Imagine a world where magic exists and England's power structure is around powerful nobles with magical power.  They ruthlessly crush all opposition and all non-powered have to do 10 years service to the powerful as slaves, they regard them as negligible and without power you have nothing really, you are disposable, this is what happens to a family when they go for their service and nothing goes according to plan.
 
I liked this, the story drew me in and I could see where much of it was believable from the premise set up by the story.  I'm really looking forward to more in this series.

[cornerfolds]

Read more of my reviews at Cornerfolds.com!

Gilded Cage has been one of my most anticipated books of 2017 since I first read the synopsis. I was immediately intrigued by the magical Equals and I couldn't wait to find out what Abi's terrible choice was. Not to mention the revolution that was hinted at. I went in fully expecting to love it. Now I have so many feelings about Gilded Cage and not all of them are good.

This book has multiple points of view. In fact, there are chapters told from seven different points of view with some characters getting one chapter each and never appearing again. Multiple POVs can be really hit or miss, but with this many different characters it's almost always going to be a miss. I had a hard time connecting to many of the characters because they'd disappear and by the time I got back to them I had to think to remember who they were.

Abi and Luke are arguably the main characters in this story. Abi has put her med school career on hold for ten years in order to get her family cushy slave days (more on that later), but when it doesn't go as planned, Luke get sent away while Abi stays with the rest of her family. Unfortunately, I didn't particularly care about either of them. I did find Luke's story to be a bit more exciting, but I still wasn't terribly concerned about his well-being and that's never a good sign.

The real bright spots in this story were the Jardine brothers - Gavar, Jenner, and Silyen. Gavar is the family heir and undoubtedly has an extremely intriguing backstory but, oddly, none of it was revealed. In the prologue we find out that he shot his baby's mother for reasons (?) that are never discussed in the 368 pages of this book. Jenner is the brother with no magic, also for reasons (?) that are never discussed. Finally there's Silyen, the mysterious brother with an absurd amount of power for reasons (?) that are never discussed and who I would love to read an entire book about. All of them seem to fall somewhere into gray on the spectrum and I'm certain they're going to be fascinating when everything about them is finally revealed.

My real issue with Gilded Cage is that very few things are sufficiently explained. The world building is never fully fleshed out. The slave days, for example, are confusing. The normal people of Britain - all those except the Skilled Equals - are forced to give up ten years of their lives to "slave days" where they will be considered sub-human and carry out hard labor. I'm not sure how a system would work where normal citizens go off to become slaves for ten years and then reenter normal society. To be honest, I think this book could have been better without slavery. There could have easily been inequality and need for a revolution between the Equals and unskilled without slave days and it would have made more sense, at least to me.

All of that being said, the story is interesting. I was intrigued by the talk of revolution and was eager to see how it would play out (or even get started). I also really wanted to see where each of the Jardine brothers would fit into this political shift - which side would they end up on? I was riveted by every single thing that happened with the Jardines! But the weird thing about this book is that it doesn't feel complete. Absolutely nothing is answered by the end and, although I know this is set up to be a series, each book should still wrap up to some extent. This one just created more questions as time went on and never really resolved anything.

At the end of the day, I'm most baffled by the synopsis. I never did figure out what Abi's "terrible choice" was. The romance that is hinted at never really gains any momentum and neither does the revolution. I want to know more about the aristocrat who "will remake the world with his dark gifts." Re-reading the synopsis after finishing the book, it seems like an overview of the series because many of the things mentioned never happened.

If everything in the synopsis actually happened in this book, it would have been much better, although the magical and political systems would still be unbelievable. What I would really love is a book about the Jardine brothers, specifically Silyen. Based on this character alone, I will be reading the next book in the series. I was definitely disappointed by Gilded Cage, but I'm holding out hope that book two will answer a lot of questions and hopefully give more insight into the Jardine family.

[chymerra]

Review comGilded Cage starts off with a young woman, Leah, running for her life across the ground of the estate she was a slave too….Kyneston. She is hoping to make it to the wall before Gavar and Jenner do. She has her baby, Liberty (aka Libby) with her and she is hoping that Libby would be able to open the gate so they could escape. It doesn’t happen. Libby doesn’t have the Skill to open the gate. Or as Silyen, the youngest and the most Skilled of the 3 brothers said, maybe she doesn’t want to leave her family. It doesn’t really matter anyways because before Leah could do anything else, Gavar shoots Leah. Miraculously, Libby isn’t hurt and Gavar takes her back to the house….leaving Jenner to mourn over Leah. Jenner does try to get Silyen to heal her but he won’t…saying that even he can’t bring back the dead. As they are talking, Leah dies.

A few months later, we are introduced to Abi, Luke, Daisy and their mother and father. Luke is the equivalent of a junior in high school and Abi, a senior. Their little sister, Daisy, is 10 years old. Luke is studying for his final exams when he notices a strange man looking at his father’s restored Austin-Healey. The man unnerves Luke, for some reason, and is quickly on his way after seeing that Daisy is celebrating her 10th birthday.

Later that night, Luke overhears something horrific. His mother and father have decided to enact their slave days. See, in this dystopian society, all commoners are supposed to serve the Equals, those who have the Skill and rule over the country, for 10 years. What is Skill….well consider it magic of a sort. The Equals can do anything with it…including healing, mind reading and building houses or maintaining a gate that only opens for the Equals. They are sent to a slave town (called Millmoor) to serve out their 10 years. After the 10 years are over, the commoners can hold certain jobs (never went into in the book), own a house and travel abroad.

So it is understandable that Luke is upset. He is losing 10 years of his life and Daisy, who is 10, will not be able to receive any education during the 10 years. Luke would be missing out on college, girls and the start of his life. I would be upset too.

But Abi had come up with a solution. She applied, for the family, at a department within the Labor Allocation Bureau called Estate Services. That is where the Equals go for their house slaves. Her application got accepted and they are being sent to serve the Jardine family on the estate of Kyneston. Seeing that Luke is under the age of 18, he goes with his family. It is the perfect solution to something that is dreaded in the lives of the common people.

Except it didn’t go that way. The day that they are being picked up by the LAB person to be driven to Kyneston, things change. The driver only has 4 names written: Mum, Dad, Daisy and Abi. Luke, unfortunately, gets sent to Millmoor. Which is unheard of because he is a minor. The officer, who was an idiot and I didn’t like him at all, and Luke’s Dad gets into a scuffle. Dad gets a beat down and the officer, Kessler, explains that they are all non people and have no rights. They all separate and then the story goes into Luke at Millmoor, Gavar at Kyneston and various areas , Silyen at Kyneston and Abi at Kyneston.

I couldn’t put my finger on how I felt about Silyen. He had an agenda and he wasn’t afraid to use people to get desired results. But I also saw glimpses of a kind person and of someone who could be more than what he was raised to be. If that makes sense.

Gavar did redeem himself in the book. I did feel bad for him because his father had an ironclad grip on him. It came out that he was in love with Leah but his father made him shoot her. Which is awful. But his father’s control over him was slipping. Gavar reminded me of an abused dog who is just waiting for its master to not be paying attention before tearing his throat out. I also feel that his fiancé will be caught up in that once Gavar snaps. But he does have a soft side. He loves his daughter and he is very taken with Daisy, who is Libby’s nurse and I believe that he would move heaven and earth to protect the both of them. It is going to be very interesting to see how Silyen and Gavar’s storylines end up in the other books.

Jenner was actually my favorite brother. He is Skillless but he is an asset to the estate and runs it. He is close to Silyen (well as close as Silyen lets him be) and he is getting very close to Abi. So close that Jenner’s mother, Lady Thalia, reminds him that he is an Equal (even if he doesn’t have powers) and that she is a slave and warns him off her.

Daisy had to have been my favorite person in the book. She was so upbeat and always saw the bright side of everything. She even liked Gavar, which kinda blew my mind. To be caring for a baby at her age was amazing (now granted Gavar did most of the caring for Libby when he was home and Daisy was just there as a babysitter) but still. She matured over the course of the book and I can’t wait to see where the author takes her character in book 2

I honestly didn’t know what to think of Abi. At times I liked her, at times I wanted to tell her to shut up and at other times I was in awe over her braveness. I am very interested to see what happens to her in book 2.

I felt awful for Luke. Being ripped from his family, put into an awful slave town and being worked to the bone, no wonder he became radicalized. His friendship with Renie, a girl his sister’s age, was very cute but at the same time dangerous. The events after was reunited with his family were beyond his control. I am very interested about what happens to him. Very interested.

Lord Whittman Jaradine, Gavar, Jenner and Silyen’s father, is a bad, bad, bad man. I literally got the chills when I was reading his scenes because his evilness just came off the pages. Again, a storyline that I would be very interested in seeing where it goes. I am also interested in seeing what happens between him and Gavar.

The end of the book ends as a cliffhanger, which made me want to yell. If you have read my reviews for any length of time, then you all know how I feel about cliffhangers. But, it did get me interested in book 2 (which I didn’t know there was going to be one until I pulled Gilded Cage up on Goodreads).

How many stars will I give Gilded Cage: 4

Why: A great dystopian book. This was a quick read with complex characters. I can’t wait to read book 2!!

Will I reread: Yes

Will I recommend to family and friends: Yes

Age Range: Teen

Why: No sex, no language. But there is violence…including a graphic scene of a head being blown off. Also, there is a disturbing side story about a man forced to live like a dog.

**I chose to leave this review after reading an advance reader copy**

[Beth C.]

Slavedays. A 10-year period when any person living in England must give themselves up to the control of the government and become a slave - complete with loss of rights, dignity, and humanity. Unless, of course, you're an Equal - an aristocrat gifted with a Skill. The equals don't become slaves - they own them, along with the rest of England. In this system live Abi and Luke, siblings who get unexpectedly separated at the beginning of their slavedays. Abi ends up working at the estate of the most powerful Equals in England, and Luke ends up in a slave town, where cruelty is common and everyone is busy simply trying to survive. But even the Equals have their masters, and sometimes the Gilded Cage is the most cruel cage of all.

The story is an interesting one, and it moved along at a fairly good clip. It alternated between fascinating and horrifying, with a dose of "this could happen" (minus the magic - maybe with technology) thrown in. The biggest issue I had with the book were the characters. Not that any of them were particularly *bad* characters, they just didn't resonate with me. I felt no particular interest in the outcome of any particular character.

The other issue with the book was *no spoilers* the ending. There are cliffhangers, and then there are endings that just kick you right off the cliff without a parachute. That's sort of how this one felt. It didn't seem like there was a whole lot of resolution, but instead like the book was longer and was just cut in half in a spot to make the next book, if that makes sense?

However, I would be curious to read the next book in the sequel. I wouldn't buy it, but I would happily get it from the library, just out of curiosity. The author has ample room for the characters to show more development, and since that was my biggest issue with this book, it's very possible that the next one could be significantly better.

*ARC received from Netgalley in exchange for honest review*