REVIEW: Feather Bound by Sarah Raughley

When Deanna's missing friend Hyde turns up at his father's funeral to claim his corporate empire and inheritance, she is swept into his glittering world of paparazzi and wealth.

But re-kindling her friendship and the dizzying new emotions along for the ride are the least of her concerns. Because Deanna has a secret – and somebody knows. Someone who is out to get Hyde. And if she doesn't play along, and help the enemy destroy him…she will be sold to the highest bidder in the black market for human swans.

Now Deanna is struggling to break free from the gilded cage that would trap her forever…

Feather Bound is a dark debut reminiscent of Gabriel García Márquez's A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings, and the twisted truth behind the fairy tale of Cinderella.

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MY THOUGHTS
I'm really conflicted about this book.
There are aspects that I actually kind of liked about this book, but there are also aspects that I really didn't like about this book and I just can't ignore.

First of all, I oddly liked the idea behind this book. I've never read about human swans and I think that it's a pretty unique idea. It's weird, but I like weird. I also thought it was pretty interesting that this was a perfectly normal thing is this world. This world is exactly like our world except that some people go through some kind of puberty thing where feathers pop out of their back! Although, it's oddly similar to someone coming out as gay as far as how people react, because human swans are often bullied and there's even cute little pamphlets telling you that it's okay to be a swan. Except sex-trafficking gays is not a thing that you see often (I'm not going to say that it doesn't happen at all). And if you steal a gay person's hair, they won't become your slave (like what happens when you take a swan's feather).
Anyway! I actually kind of thought that the idea of human swans was interesting! But, of course, the book hardly ever focuses on the swans.
THIS BOOK IS ABOUT BLACKMAIL.
Seriously, the entire book is about people blackmailing other people and I just can't stand books like that.
Books about blackmail just make me angry at everybody and how am I supposed to enjoy a book if I'm so angry?
There was also way too much sexual content in this book for my liking and most of it the book would have been perfectly fine without <highlight to view spoiler>Did we really need that thing with Anton and his stepmom? *shudders*<end of spoiler>

IN CONCLUSION
I was fully expecting a fairytale like read. It's mentioned in the synopsis. There's even a praise on the back of the book that says "This how fairytales should be written in the 21st century." But this book is not a fairytale read, it's a book about blackmail. If this book had more focus on the swans and more of a fairytale quality, then I would have enjoyed it so much more. But no, it's about blackmail and unnecessary content, which makes me very sad.

I hereby give this book

2 Wheels

Meaning: It was okay