dancers_and_dragons 's review for:

This Gilded Abyss by Rebecca Thorne

5.0

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Thorne does a stunning job of sweeping the reader along into this world, where mysteries run rampant and are unfolded as the pages turn. The tension and care and tumult between the characters was perfect to make me feel for them through each chapter, and the attention to detail brought things to life. 

While I'd wished for a less ambiguous ending, I'm definitely bittersweet about finishing this book and I'm looking forward to the next installment of this series. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Murder, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, Classism

Moderate: Cursing, Medical content, Alcohol, Pandemic/Epidemic

Minor: Body horror, Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Religious bigotry, Gaslighting

Sexual content:

Pages 247-261 on Kindle, unsure of the count on other devices (the first half of chapter 23) contains explicit sexual acts between the two main protagonists. All sexual acts are consensual, but do have a layer of trauma behind them, as they had a previous sexual relationship that ended sourly.

Colonisation/Xenophobia/War: The country the protagonists live in, Valkesh, is at war with another society, the Triolan. From what I can determine from how certain things are explained, these societies do not look different from each other or have different racial features, but they do hold animosity toward each other.

While Thorne does a good job of showing that not all members of either society are a monolith, this progress from their perspective is largely unhelped by the events of the book and there is little to no resolution. One of Nix's best friends is a Triolan, which is further describes under "Betrayal" below. But the Valkesh do hold an upper hand in the war between them and have limited tolerance to listen to alternate points of view besides Kessandra, one of the subarchs in the monarchy.

Betrayal:

One of Nix's squad, Leon, is a Triolan and is working against her and the Valkeshians as a double agent, even though she trained him up and mentored him. His betrayal comes as shock to her and is described with a significant amount of grief and concern. He does attempt to kill her near the end of the book.

Classism: There is a clear hierarchy between civilians and the monarchy, with aspects of wealth and privilege that are mentioned heavily throughout the book and occasionally used as a power play between characters. Emotional abuse/child abuse/confinement:

Kessandra, one of the main characters, does reveal that the primarch/head monarch has kept her confined for years, gaslighted her and the country about the illness they're investigating, and has attempted to kill her multiple times since she was young. While this is not explicitly labelled as abuse by anyone in the book, aspects of it are explicitly described.

Confinement: At various points, the main characters or side characters are confined in rooms for quarantine or in attempts to barricade themselves from others. Also, 90% of the book takes place in a vessel that is travelling beneath the ocean.