The second in the Gilded series I was ready to see where our favorite duo ended up after a crazy cliffhanger ending. I absolutely adore Meyer's writing style and cursed did not disappoint. this retelling of Rumpelstiltskin was so intriguing from start to finish.

After reading and recommending Gilded to many customers, I eagerly anticipated the sequel, Cursed, by Marissa Meyer.
It far exceeded my expectations.

I went on a journey with Cursed and couldn't sleep before finishing the final chapters. The scene-setting is grim, the fairytale villains are clever and terrible, and our protagonists are brave and resourceful. They depend on eachother and grow together. It's pretty much everything I could want from a fairytale reimagining.

(Spoilers)
My only note of caution with these two books is that they contain scenes of violence against children. In true YA & Marissa Meyer fashion, everyone gets a Happily-Ever-After of some kind, but it was hard to love the children with Serilda only to see them harmed.

Overall, a great series & all the love to Rebecca Soler for her audio narration.

Serilda has secrets she can't share with the people she loves most, the people she can't find a way to save. The Erlking isnt acting like himself, trying to make her beileve he"s a victim. And now she's going into hidden rooms of the castle to save herself and Gild, and the five children she feels responsible for. But what she finds might part of somwthing bigger than her and everything she wants.

I was desperately waiting for this book and it surpassed anything and everything I was hoping for! So many twists I didn’t see coming and I couldn’t put it down. I’ve already preordered my finished copy, can’t wait to reread!

I would start off by mentioning that this book is even better than the first part, so all the fans are in for a great treat. This one is even more high-strung, evokes more emotions, and is akin to a roller coaster ride. The story concludes really well, especially considering the build-up. The twists and turns were especially good at making the read really unpredictable, which adds to the pleasure of reading it.

There were some typographical errors, which I am sure will be rectified in the final copy. Despite being almost double the length of the final copy (as per Goodreads), it felt like a whirlwind read, and I didn’t need to take too much time to finish.

Apart from these, the story was extremely well assimilated. The conclusion was also creative and novel, the story a nice touch. The characters of Erlking and Perchta were very well written, and the various subversions of expectations worked out really well.

What I liked best about the story is definitely the ups and downs of Serilda and Gild’s relationship, but it’s closely followed by how the original fairy tale has been transformed into the novel. The shift from a heteronormative narrative and the inclusion of gender fluidity among the gods was a great inclusion. The story of Rumple and Stiltskin in the series itself was also really interesting, although a clarification of why the prince chose to take the barren northern kingdom was a little vague. The inclusion of mythical and historical in the fairy tale element was also very interesting.