Gild by Raven Kennedy: A Book Review

Gild is fine. I mean that as neither a compliment nor an insult. It is a perfectly serviceable fantasy.

Synopsis

Gild is the first book in Raven Kennedy’s five-part Plated Prisoner series, loosely inspired by the Greek myth of King Midas.

Auren is the favoured consort of King Midas, a woman he has gold-touched so that her skin and hair shimmer permanently gold. She lives in his gilded castle in the frozen mountains of Highbell, kept safe behind palace walls; she never leaves.

When political upheaval forces Midas to strike a dangerous deal, Auren finds herself outside the castle for the first time, travelling across kingdoms and beginning to question everything she thought she knew about the man she loves. It is a story about captivity dressed up as protection, and what happens when a woman who has accepted her cage starts to see it clearly.

My review

Before I get into the book itself, I want to talk about how it got here, because I find the publishing story behind Gild both genuinely inspiring and more than a little frustrating. Raven Kennedy self-published Gild in October 2020. No agent, no traditional publisher, no marketing department. She sold half a million copies on the strength of the story alone, riding the wave of BookTok romantasy enthusiasm at exactly the right moment. Penguin then picked the series up. And while I am glad the book found a wider audience, I can’t help but notice what that trajectory reveals: that a book Penguin likely would have ignored on submission was suddenly worth acquiring once someone else had already done the hard work of building its readership. Kennedy, along with authors like Penelope Douglas, built their audiences independently, without the infrastructure of a traditional publisher. That is genuinely empowering. The frustrating part is watching big publishing swoop in once the risk has already been absorbed by the author. I sincerely hope Kennedy is receiving the support and recognition at Penguin that she earned the hard way.

The series has also been optioned for television by Peter Guber’s Mandalay Television.

Kennedy has said the entire series formed around a single image, a woman in a cage with ribbons trailing down her back. She knew immediately that the story was Auren’s, not Midas’s, and built outward from there.

The concept is genuinely strong. A woman, gold-touched by a king who treats her as his most precious possession, kept safe in a gilded cage she has been conditioned to experience as love. The problem is the opening chapters, which lean heavily on telling and exposition at the expense of story. Had I been reading a physical copy, I might have put it down before it found its footing. As an audiobook, it was easier to stay with, and the book does improve significantly once it moves past its own setup.

I listened to the Penguin Audio version narrated by Bella Sanby and Harlen Corbo. Bella reads with care and clarity, and I have no criticism of her performance; her voice simply wasn’t quite the right fit for me personally. I have since heard there is a newer duet recording by Lilly Drake and Anthony Palmini, and I suspect Anthony would have done particularly well with the pirate scenes. I wish I had known about that version before I started. The honest truth about Gild in 2026 is that the romantasy market has changed significantly since 2020. When Kennedy self-published this, it was one of a smaller number of books doing what it was doing. The genre has since expanded enormously, and some of what has come after is more tightly written, more emotionally propulsive, and more confident in its romantic core. Gild has no romance to speak of in this first instalment; the relationship that readers come back for is only beginning to take shape, which means the book is essentially asking you to invest ten hours in world-building and setup for a payoff that arrives in later volumes.

The twist at the end is genuinely interesting, and it worked on me. I am somewhat curious about the second book. That curiosity sits at a comfortable three stars; not compelled, but not opposed.

What I liked / what I didn’t

What I liked

The central concept is strong, and the thematic territory —captivity as protection, possession as love—is worth exploring. The world of Orea is distinct and visually well-realised. The twist at the end is effective and earns its cliffhanger. At ten hours, it does not overstay its welcome.

What I didn’t

The opening chapters are heavy on telling and exposition, which is a slow way to begin a book. There is no romance in this first book to give the story emotional momentum; readers are asked to trust that it is coming. In a genre that has grown considerably more competitive since 2020, that trust is harder to extend to a book that offers setup rather than satisfaction.

Final verdict

Gild is a solid first instalment in a series that earns its devoted following. If you enjoy romantasy and are willing to invest in a five-book arc, this is worth your time, particularly if you start knowing that book one is the slowest entry. If you are new to the genre or looking for something with more immediate emotional payoff, there are books I would recommend before this one. 

Also, as I’ve seen someone else mention: King Midas is the most unreliable MMC love interest since Tamlin.