This is the second book in the Red Rising trilogy by Pierce Brown.
4.5/5 stars
Paraphrased from Goodreads
Golden Son continues the stunning saga of Darrow, a rebel forged by tragedy, battling to lead his oppressed people to freedom from the overlords of a brutal elitist future built on lies. Now fully embedded among the Gold ruling class, Darrow continues his work to bring down Society from within. A life-or-death tale of vengeance with an unforgettable hero at its heart, Golden Son guarantees Pierce Brown’s continuing status as one of fiction’s most exciting new voices.
I love this book. I just love this trilogy. I thought overall this one was great. I thought it was slower than the first one at times. There was a lot of just hanging out in space, not really doing a whole lot, which is why I took .5 of a star off. But it’s still so good.
Again, I love Sevro and the Howlers. They were so good in this book, and didn’t lose any of their glory from the first one. I also love Mustang (shocker, I know). She is such. a good. character. I love her. She’s so good in this book. So manipulative and smart and witty and bitchy and I love all of it.
The fight scenes were super epic. Darrow and Sevro have a really cool one about halfway through where they take over a spaceship and it’s super badass. And then the Iron Rain happens and it’s so good. The plans were all good and well executed and thought-out.
ALSO IN THIS ONE WE FIND OUT WHO ARES IS AND LET ME TELL YOU, IT TOOK ME COMPLETELY BY SURPRISE. I was mainly not expecting to learn who Ares was, ever. I thought he/she would just be like a name, or organization and we never get to know who runs it. But we do and it makes so much sense honestly.
LET ME JUST SAY ABOUT THE ENDING (no spoilers I promise): I was just reminded about how good his characters are. Roque and Cassius and the Jackal are such good characters. AND VICTRA. Victra literally broke my heart. I loved her even more after the ending of this book.
Texts I sent to my best friend while reading the last 15% of this book
“[character] IS ARES??????”
“I trusted [character]”
“I can’t deal with this shit”
“UUUGGHHGGHGGHHHHHHHHH”
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