Manumission

by R.A. Hatton

MANUMISSION

A Rebellion Ignited by a Forbidden Love

Within an old kingdom, our elven race of warriors kept
humans as slaves, and we thrived. Until the rebellion started,
threatening our peace and prosperity. Now I hunt them, unwilling
to rest until I find the traitors of the crown.

When I meet the branded human, scheduled for death, he awakens
a desire within me that I never knew existed. I start to question the
rules, as I begin to discover the truths, long buried in blood.

My name is General Truda and now I must choose
between obeying the laws of my species, or to free the forbidden human who repairs my heart.

Genres: Fantasy, Fantasy Romance, Dystopia

ebook

Published April 2, 2021

About the author

R.A Hatton is an author from the United Kingdom.
She is passionate about graphic design, reading, and writing, with a love of tea, chocolate, and dogs!
Manumission is R.A Hatton's debut Fantasy/Romance novel and she is working on releasing many more stories in the coming years.
You can follow the author to show your support by joining her writing social media pages or sign up for a monthly newsletter via her website to hear about her many upcoming projects.

Reviews

[Becky (romantic_pursuing_feels) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Note: Some of my goodreads shelves can be spoilers

Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Readability: 📖📖📖
Feels: 🦋🦋
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋 (Scenes were a bit too light and short for me)
Sex Scene Length: 🍑🍑🍑
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥+ I have notes for 2 scenes but feel like I might have missed one? Not sure.
Humor: Not really
Perspective: First person only from the heroine
Cliffhanger: No
HEA/HFN: Yes
Epilogue: Yes
Format: read the e-book version through Kindle Unlimited
(Descriptions found at end of my review)

Should I read in order?
This is Hatton’s debut.

Basic plot:
General Truda starts to question the rules of her society when she meets a slave scheduled for death.

Give this a try if you want:
- fantasy romance
- tall elf heroine
- human hero
- strong themes of right the wrongs
- you’re okay with slavery, murder, and death as content warnings
- medium-ish steam – I only have notes on 2 steam but want to say there was one more towards the end? My KU subscription is up so I can’t check

Ages:
- Hero is 29, didn’t catch heroine

First line:
Today I was confident my sword would run red with the blood of our enemies.

My thoughts:
I really wanted to love this novel, because I think it had a really unique story line and goals for the heroine! But a few things ended up not working for me, just some personal preferences.

The biggest thing for me, was I felt like the hero and heroine were not together nearly enough. The first 30% of the book was a bit slow for me because I kept waiting for more interaction between the mains.

The steam was also a bit on the light side to me. I loved the actions in the scenes, but wanted more emotional pull (especially with how much they both had overcome to get to that point), and details. I think for me I just wanted them longer to be able to get those feelings in. Those that like open door sex but want to keep it light will enjoy this.

And we didn’t get any hero perspective and I always struggle with that and am sad.

I couldn’t help but think this world didn’t get quite it though, as women. They were oppressed by men, women discovered magic, and then they ended up taking over and changes things to suit their needs. But they are still oppressed in my opinion. The fact that they don’t have breeding autonomy is enough to showcase that.

Overall, I think Rattan has some fabulous ideas going in this world and I’m really curious how she’s going to continue it in the next book. It was nice reading such a strong female lead, and really going through her change of perspective through the novel. The start is a touch slow, but then it really begins to pick up and there’s quite a bit of intrigue and action scenes for those that like that.

World Building

- It’s a requirement of the best warriors and strongest elves to pass their knowledge and skill to the next generation to ‘remain an unassailable race’ to they are made to have babies
- When you go to the breeder, you are given a potion for if you will have a boy (which is born a ‘Guan’ or a slave) or a female, who becomes an elf leader
- Slaves are not allowed to live past the age of 30 (our hero is 29)


Quotes/spoiler-y thoughts:

To show the beginning stance of elf women versus men (heroine reflects on the death of her slave)

I had never yelled at him or punished him, but I had also never been kind. I had never said thank you or given him a gift of gratitude. It was not our way. Men were beneath us, they were our slaves, born into our race of female elf warriors as servants. The histories told us that a long time ago we had been human, in a world of constant war because of men, with their natural inclination and tendencies towards violence, until a group of women discovered they could use magic. They rose together and killed all but a few of the men.



Content warnings:

- death of a favored slave
- lack of body autonomy – heroine is decreed it’s time for her to breed and she must go to a ‘breeder’ every other night for 3 months until pregnant. When she goes there, a man is chained to the wall, there to sexually serve her.
- mention of infanticide – before they controlled a fetus’s genetics, most male babies were killed at birth
- slaves are branded, killed at age 30 and whipped




Locations of kisses/intimate scenes:

31% - kiss
44% - kiss
63% - 🔥kisses, oral for her, her on top (it’s all fairly light)
72% - kisses
87% - 🔥BJ to wall sex (somewhat short)


Extra stuff like what my review breakdown means, where to find me, and book clubs


Full break down on what my ratings above mean here:
Overall: How I felt about it everything considered!
Readability: How ‘readable’ was the book? Did I fly through it? Did I have to tell myself to pick it back up repeatedly? Were any passages confusing?
Feels: Totally subjective to each person but did the book give me any tingles? Any butterflies? Did it rip my heart out (in a good way?)
Emotional depth: How well do I feel I know the characters at the end? How much did I feel their emotions throughout the story?
Sexual tension: Again, subjective, but how strong was the wanting and longing to me between the characters? A book might have strong sexual tension without a single touch.
Romance: Was there romance? Did romantic things happen? This can be actions/words/thoughts of the characters and again is subjective.
Sensuality: This is how the intimate scenes are written. Kisses and sexual scenes – how sensual were they? Were they on the mechanical side? Was there emotional pull tied in? Were the details explicit or flowery? These are subjective but generally (1) too short to get a good judgement (2) not all what I'm looking for - very vague or flowery prose (3) either not explicit enough or not enough emotional pull (too mechanical/physically descriptive without the emotions) (4) what I love in a scene (5) absolute perfection - perfect balance of emotional longing and explicit descriptions
Sex Scene Length: How long the bedroom scenes are (generally (1) is 1-3 sentences (2) is a few paragraphs to a page-ish (3) is about average, a few pages (4) more well developed scenes, quite a few pages with descriptions (4) the majority of the book takes place in the bedroom. This is always hard to tell for me on audio!
Steam Scale: Generally, each flame is a scene. If scenes are super close together I sometimes combine them. If a scene is super short or so vague I don’t know what’s happening, I don’t count it. There’s some levels of grey but generally the number of flames is how many sex scenes there are (I max out at 5 so I’ll put a + after if there’s more than that)
HEA/HFN mean Happy Ever After and Happy For Now


Find me
Instagram || The Storygraph || Bookbub ||

Book Clubs
The Ton and the Tartans (Historical Romance)
Upturned Petticoats and Undone Cravats (Historical Romance with Steam Requirements)
A Love Less Ordinary (Science Fiction, Paranormal, Monster, Fantasy)
Modern Manuscripts (Contemporary Romance)
Words for the Wicked (Contemporary Romance with Steam Requirements)
Vintage Romance (Old School Romance – published 2000 and prior)

[H-e-l-e-n-a · Rating 4 out of 5]

El reino de Nysa es gobernado y administrado por mujeres elfos. Los hombres son esclavos llamados Guan y su función en este mundo es básicamente servidumbre y procreación.

Truda, es la General del Ejército, y por instrucciones de la reina, debe integrarse al programa para engendrar una nueva guerrera. Para ello, es asignada al Guan #23 llamado Erik.

Truda y Erik no llevan a cabo lo que solicita la reina. Básicamente porque Truda no quiere hijos. Así que se ven forzados a pasar tiempo juntos en una habitación fingiendo que tienen unas actividades distintas. 😅

La historia me gustó. Vemos como Truda pasa de ser una mujer seria y aparentemente indiferente a lo que la rodea para dar paso a una persona más sensible y a realmente ver la vida que tienen que soportar los esclavos. Toda este tiempo en contacto con Erik la mueven a cuestionarse todo lo que le han enseñado desde pequeña y a impulsar el cambio.

Si me ando imaginando una peli de esta historia. Ojo aquí productores. 😏

¿Lo malo? Ese final. Todo se resuelve en un instante. Después de años y años con los Guan sometidos, ¿nada más ocupaban a Truda para levantarse en armas? No lo sé Rick. 🤣

📖
"...you’re not evil, and have always acted with your good heart. If you’ve ever done anything wrong, it’s because the world has deceived you."
_
Erik had become my sun, the light that cleared my mind and brought warmth to my face.

[Laura · Rating 2 out of 5]

Great plot line.
Characters need a lot more development, I couldn't care less about anyone other than the fox. I just wasn't invested in anyone, they were very two dimensional. Maybe it's the first person narrative?
Overall, I was intrigued by the world and I think with more depth into characters and more exploration of the world this could have been a really great book. The storyline progressed very slowly in the first half and then far too quickly at the end.

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful. It has a great plot that is based on a fantasy world. Truda is a female warrior Elf that protects the queen and princess. Her mother was best friends with the queen but died when she was young. The world is run by women and men are only used as slaves between chores and breeding. She is chosen to be breeding to make a strong person. She goes the breeding house to room 23 and chooses not to breed as she should have the choice not forced . She starts talking to the guy and a connection grows when he gets hurt for protecting another. She comes back with balms to help heal him. She breaks him out and finds out everything she was taught is a lie . Can she believe what she is told vs what she has been taught for years.

It was a little slow the start but give the plot a 5 stars. I wish this was a series as I would like to know more about the other people.

[✩ star ✩ · Rating 3 out of 5]

It wasn’t bad but it felt a bit slow in the beginning. There were some corny moments/jokes between Truda and Erik, that made me want to close my eyes and fade away. To be honest, I only got really hooked on the book near the 60-70 percent mark. The first half just felt a little boring to me, but other half was too good.

[Brianna💛 · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. I HONESTLY don’t know what I was expecting from this book but I saw it on tic tok and I was pulled in. What i WAS NOT expecting was the main character who be forced into a breeding house with the love interest. Wtf? Normally I would love this kind of thing.. This is a slow burn, however I think there were so missed opportunities here in developing the relationship. For one, Erik’s character development was decidedly underwhelming. I didn’t feel like I knew much about him. I would have wanted his POV. I just couldn’t understand the dynamics of their relationship and wanted more.

The best part of this book was the emotional connection that Truda developed towards slavery and the evolution of that throughout the book. The author makes you feel horrible about the situations of the guans/other males in this universe. She does an amazing job of showing and not telling. This aspect of the book is powerful.

Lastly, the world building and plot conclusion was boring. Everything lined up too perfectly. I felt no real attachment towards the kingdom. Sadly I ended up skipping through the last bits because I seriously couldn’t have cared less about what was going to happen. All of that was just too much to be resolved in one book if you ask me.

This book is getting 3.5 stars because I believe the author has talent and I had a visceral reaction to the descriptions of abuse towards the men. I didn’t mind the romance but wasn’t wowed either. Also this is spicy towards the end.

[Daniëlle Faber · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it! After seeing the mess they made, women evolve into higher beings through magic and rule the world. Men are only to be used as slaves and for breeding purposes. General Trudy grew up believing every bit of what she’s been taught. But after being forced to enter the breeding program and meeting Erik, she starts to question things. Maybe it is time for a change?
It has romance, excitement & suspense! And I thoroughly enjoyed this!!!

[Chey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book had a phenomenal plot line and the author did an incredible job with the world building and character development. The connections they made felt real and genuine. There was never a dull moment where I felt the story lagged or become bogged down. From start to finish you are pulled into this world and you are almost sad to leave when the book ends.

[Nic Harris · Rating 4 out of 5]

✨Review: Manumission - R A Hatton✨

❗️Spoilers❗️

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I was very kindly gifted a copy of this ebook by @rahattonfantasy in exchange for an honest review.

Description: Within an old kingdom, an elven race of warriors rules and keeps human men as slaves.

General Truda is one of the fiercest warriors tasked with ending the rebellion by hunting all traitors to the crown. 

Her world is thrown into turmoil when she is assigned a human to breed with and she begins to question everything she knows about the world she is fighting to preserve. 

Review:

I loved the concept of this book. The author completely turns the idea of male dominance on its head and puts the females in charge and I was here for it. I loved seeing so many strong female characters and the utter belief they had in female dominance.

General Truda gave me mixed feelings; she’s self righteous and wholeheartedly believes she is right. This made her a bit unlikeable for me and I struggled to shift away from that view although I definitely warmed to her as the story progressed.

The mix of warriors, elves, humans and mages was really interesting and I’d have liked to see more of the mages. There is a battle scene at the end and would have loved that to be built on a bit more as this really showed some of the differences between the races. The plot twists were clever and definitely kept me on my toes.

I saw a description saying this is Wonder Woman meets Gladiator which is a pretty spot on reflection of this book. I liked this as a debut novel and I look forward to seeing future works from the author.

#

[Corinne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can honestly say, I have never read a book like this, in anyway. I knew going in that there were “human” slaves and assumed it would be some kind of paranormal, mythical beings in control. I did not realize however, that these human slaves were all men and the mythical beings were all female- right off the bat I was here for it. That was until, I started to realize a few things about myself….

Firstly, and mainly… that I am not as much of a feminist as I originally thought. 🤔😬

I have read so many books about women being used as slaves for all kinds of reasons. I have read about women being used and captured and pawned, and weak and strong- and loved so many of these books with so many different perspectives. But in the end the strong man (mentally, physically, both?) saves or helps save the day.

This book however… the man was not “alpha” or even a “take charge” guy, at all. Not only was he not the leader in anyway, but he was also a little needy? A little whiny? A little… *gulp* too emotional… He was the “damsel in distress” and as much as I tried, I just couldn’t like him for it. In the year of the Barbie movie (it will now always be the year of the Barbie movie), I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but it’s true… 🫣

I have no problem with the female characters being the ones in charge, and stronger, or even being the warriors, but for the men to be in no way… anything …. I just couldn’t.

With all of that being said (and I could go on and on) the writing of this book was so good, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I think this book is a perfect book club, or buddy read because there could be so many discussions had about it, in all kinds of different ways. So if anyone else has the second book “Incandescent” ARC, let’s read it together!!

Overall ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
Romance 🩷
Spice 🌶️
Darkness 🖤

Thank you RA Hatton for this ARC in exchange for my honest review!! 🥰

[Nanii’s Book Corner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book Title: Manumission (Kingdom of Slaves #1)
Author: R.A. Hatton
Star Rating: ★★★★★

𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒅 𝒊𝒇 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒆𝒏𝒋𝒐𝒚 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒇𝒐𝒍𝒍𝒐𝒘𝒊𝒏𝒈:
💜 HEA
✨ Elves
💜 Dystopian
✨ Slow Burn
💜 Forbidden Love
✨ Female Warriors

This book follows General Truda and Erik. Truda is loyal to her queen, striking enemies down at the queen’s command with no hesitation until she starts questioning the rules of the city and goes searching for answers. Erik is the human paired with Truda after she’s forced into the program to conceive a child that she doesn’t want. This book started a bit slow for me but once I got into it I simply couldn’t put it down. This is a slow burn, so take that for what it is, it’s SLOW and it doesn’t have as much spice as I usually read but the plot absolutely makes up for it. The world building and the writing itself was so good. Loved the strong Elf FMC. The only thing I would say I didn’t exactly like in this book was someone’s attitude when he didn’t get the answers he wanted(I’m looking at you Erik) everything else I enjoyed and I am very excited and ready to get into Acqueline’s story. If you ever take a rec from me, let it be this one.

𝑫𝑰𝑺𝑪𝑳𝑨𝑰𝑴𝑬𝑹: As always, although this is an E-ARC, my thoughts are my own and this is my honest review. Thank you to R.A. Hatton for the ARC opportunity.

☽ 𝑯𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒚 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒊𝒏𝒈 💚

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆

[Dani (piggindani_reads) · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a brilliant concept, women warrior elves rule and human men are nothing but mere slaves. There to aid with menial day to day tasks and with breeding. I love the role reversal! 💜🗡️🥰

For me this is more of a character driven story, that might just be because I love Truda, but there is plenty more going on as well.
A rebel uprising, deceit, death, spice (*fans myself*) and a beautiful array of characters that you’ll love & hate in equal measure!
Not to mention surprises, some of which may even have you saying (like I did) “OMG! WHAT?!” It’s awesome.

I’m in love with General Truda. She is incredible. Fierce, strong and powerful, but with this hidden tenderness and, to some degree, loneliness, (well, until Erik comes along), and this makes her such a captivating character. I was immediately drawn to her and loved watching her personal growth especially as she begins to question what she once believed in.

The world building and descriptions are amazing. I loved walking side by side with Truda through the Kingdom of Nysa. I particularly loved the fight scenes, (be they training or in battle), as I could clearly picture the movements the characters made which helped bring them to life.

This is an amazing fantasy romance and I honestly cannot wait to read more from R.A. Hatton. 🗡️♥️

[Belinda Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed every second of this exciting read. This was an action packed read with an impressive cast set in a wonderfully world. 

Trudy is an impressive FMC who’s passionate about her work and is a great judge of character. She lives in a world where men are looked down on and are only used for breeding and for manual labor. But, she doesn’t let her surroundings cloud her judgement.

They are taught to look down on men. Men aren’t allowed to live past a certain age. The men were taken as slaves and abused at every chance. When they rebel, the rebellion is cut down. But the real reason behind the rebellion was concealed from everyone.

Trudy meets Erik at the breeding house she’s forced to attend by the Queen’s orders. He paves the way for Trudy to start questioning her beliefs and the ways of the Elves. General Trudy grew up believing everything she was taught. Her mother was a fierce warrior who served the Queen before Trudy. 

She has been hunting rebels for a long time before she learns the truth. She took it in stride when her whole world crumbled. She didn’t let prejudice colour her judgement and learnt the truth meticulously. I loved watching her choose her own path and recognise the facts.

The romance between Erik and Trudy was swoon worthy. They are incredible together. I would have loved it more if we got to learn more about Erik’s past. This was a single POV book that’s heavily character driven. 

There was never a dull moment throughout the book and I enjoyed every second of it. Thank you so much to the author for sending me a copy of the book to review.

[Lila · Rating 5 out of 5]

Free Kindle e-book in exchange for an honest review as part of the Indie June author month.

If the roles were reversed and women evolved to be superior than men, would they manage to resist the temptation of power and control? Or would they eventually become the same as men are today?

This is explored in Manumission following General Truda's story. As the strongest warrior in the kingdom, she is ordered by the queen to enter the breeding programme. Truda defies her by refusing to engage, all the while slowly falling in love with the Guan (as the men are called) she was paired with.

It shows that even though in the story women evolve to become elves, as time passes their recount of history and how women were treated before, becomes more and more self-centered and man-hating. Just like it is human to eventually start to think of yourself as better than.

The story was slow-paced in the beginning, but my favourite part was that though Warrior, Truda is still part of the Queen's Council and the story shows us all the intricacies involved with that role.

There were some minor grammar mistakes and the pace could have been quicker in my taste. However, that doesn't change my rating of 5 out of 5 stars. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes fantasy. But also to those who don't necessarily love it as much. Though there is magic and elves, the story doesn't read like a typical high fantasy.

[Lynn Lipinski · Rating 4 out of 5]

Imagine a world where women are magic elves, men are slaves and love between the two is forbidden. MANUMISSION by R.A. Hatton brings this world to life in her engrossing novel following elven General Truda as she's sent on the one mission she dreaded: to the Breeding House to get pregnant. Little does she know that this action will alter her whole perspective on the female-dominated, sexist society she has lived in all her life that believed men never evolved, "remaining insentient and imbecilic, the lowest of beings." Kudos to Hatton for her strong fighting and steamy love scenes as well as her robust imagination to bring the Kingdom of Nysa to life. As a whole, the novel reads well with good pacing and plot developments, though in a few instances the descriptive writing and dialogue fall a bit flat. A handful of minor typos drew my attention, but did not keep me from thoroughly enjoying the book and reading it through in about a week's time. I recommend this action-packed love story with a strong heroine and magical sparkle.

[Emily Pennington · Rating 5 out of 5]

Challenging Core Beliefs . . .

This is a different world, or perhaps not so different, where women have become elf-like magical beings to rule, and men have become servants and breeders. The women have all the authority and power. General Truda grew up among this society and strongly believed everything she had learned. Now they are forcing her to enter the breeding program and have a child. She will meet Erik and find out things are not what she had expected, not what she had been taught to believe. Will this challenge to the beliefs she had always defended change her path now? Does she truly see society and the leadership as no longer perfect but equally subject to corruption? And what will she do about the knowledge she has gained?

This is an enlightening story with tension, romance, and danger. Even when you think you have made a better world, it’s never perfect and corruption can make it vile in no time at all. Grab your copy and see how Truda will respond to the challenge to her beliefs.

[emimibooklove · Rating 4 out of 5]

A world were women reign Supreme while men are are the weakest of the weak. Slaves to the powerful.

Women along time ago found magic. They were able to change physically. They have Magic. Sick of being lead by men they are know powerful and rule over all. Men are slaves.

When the Queens commander is released from her duties as commander for a short time, it is to breed with a man. Women are able to genetically change DNA. Insuring more babies are born female than mail. The Queens commander is less than impressed with her new orders.

Faking her new "duties" she ends up getting to know the man and falls for him. Falls in love enough to want to free him from the hellish life he lives.

Can she do it? Can she go against everything she's been taught? Everything she upholds for this one man?

[Sarah Rizk · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book!  A world run by female elves and ths men, known as Guan, are slaves.  I thought this was such a unique book and very different from pretty much everything I've ever read.  I love the character development of General Truda.  At the beginning, we see that she does feel, something, for her Guan even though she doesn't actually show him any kindness.  This just makes how her "relationship" with Erik unfolds feel more believable.  At the beginning, she believes her actions are just, but as the story goes on, she realizes it's wrong, and the elves are cruel to the Guan.  This book is packed with action, romance, a character twist, an overthrown queen, and rebellion.  It was such an enjoyable read, I literally got through it in one day.  I can't wait to see what comes next from this author.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable read

I thoroughly enjoyed this book only reason I rated it at four out of five stars is because it didn’t really start picking up until about 75% of the way through the book. The first 75% is very much just story building and moving the story along, and we don’t really start seeing a heading or any kind of climax until about 87% of the way through. Regardless of the somewhat slow moving first part of the book I did enjoy the world that the author created. It was a very interesting take on the Amazonian aspect that women are the better and dominant sex and that men are only good for… well one thing!😉 Anyway regardless of that I did enjoy it and I hope of a readers will too.

[Ritika Goyal · Rating 5 out of 5]

Damn this book is a pure masterpiece🩶"Manumission" is based on fantasy world where it is run by women and whose slaves are men.

This book shows the opposite world where men are treated like once women were used to be treated as. It shows the world rule by women and not men.

I really loved the way author Potrayed the story, the emotions, the characters. It's really so perfect.

I'm not a huge fan of reading about wars and all but dammit if this book hadn't exceeded my expectations.

Love is everything, love is something which can make you see things you never noticed. This book is an example of that.

Since I started this book and until it's end there wasn't a single time I was bored or wanted to skip it or take a break. So I'll highly recommend you guys, please do read this and support her❤

Thankyou for giving me the copy of this book and to review it🥹🩵

[Shanny Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book...

The book starts a little slow as it explains who the characters are, where they are and what's going on with a little bit of a back story.

But when it picks up it's stride I got really invested in the story and the characters as the changed and grow throught the story. I found myself sad and concerned at part and shock at plot twists. Happy for the characters at other parts.

The main FMC is an female elf called Truda, she is a strong general how is a little arrogant and set in her ways at the beginning. Until she meet Erik who is a male human guan who changes her look on life and turns her world as she knows it upside down. As in the story the male are only used and slaves for building and breeding and surving the elf females.

[Breaux Reanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tiktok made me read it and I'm so glad I did

I got this book during my indie June TBR and had taken a really long time getting to it because so.e of the other books were really slow. Then I started seeing posts for this book in particular over and over so I moved it to the front of my tbr list and finished it In 2 days.


Let me start with this book is amazing. The world building, the spice, the drama, the action had me going non stop. My husband is mad at me for staying up so late to read and not waking up to take the kids to school. Will probably buy a physical copy for my 5star book shelf.

[Alex Wolf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't you just love it when you are a few pages in and you can already tell that you are going to love a book? This book was like that for me. I was gripped. I loved the characters. Truda who was the main character, I related to so much. I loved the development between her and Erik, it felt like such a great and natural pace. The fantasy world was interesting and balanced the plot too.

Finally, the timing was just great for me. I was getting down with real life issues and this book spun those issues on its head offering me a difference perspective which was a balm to my soul. Its the reason I love books and this did that for me. A favourite read for 2022.

[Abbie V · Rating 5 out of 5]

Manumission rekindled my passion for reading. I have never read Fantasy Romance before, but I can assure you, now I will be. This book made me laugh, cry, and sometimes frustrated (in the perfect way!) There was never a time that I could predict what would happen next. It had me hooked with its story and character building, as well as the subtle references pulled from real-life historical events (such as the Romans.)

Thank you R.A Hatton author for creating a strong female character, who is learning how to cope with her emotions in a society which has told her how to feel.

[Nikki Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a brilliant idea - taking the female-led kingdom with men as slaves and making the hardened General the hero.

I went into this thinking it would be all about girl power- and in many ways, it is - but it is about so much more. The power of love, the importance of history, and the overwhelming truth that the people in power are not always the right people for the job - whether they are elves or humans.

I enjoyed the read, and would read more although I feel that some of the characters were a little flat - it was quite slow in places, but the spice was well-written and the premise was definitely sound.

[Elsie Pitt · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a pretty good read with an interesting premise. I liked how this is something completely different for me and not my usual reading type. I was very interested within this world and I have to say it is vibrant and visual with it play on words. Very different and I look forward to more from this author.

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.

[Stella_L421 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was lucky enough to receive a ARC copy of this book. And I am so happy I did! It was incredibly unique. Unlike any fantasy book I’ve ever read. A kingdom which woman rule, and men are used only as slaves. But when general Trudy meets slave Erik, and love Blooms, she believes it might be time for a change. Amazing plot. And amazing character arc. This was a fantastic fantasy book. And I definitely recommend!

[Kyla Clarkston · Rating 4 out of 5]

I sat and read this in one day. I really liked this book. General Truda seems like a real badass and you can sense her general confusion as she battles what she thought she knew and what she is realizing is truth. R.A. Hattan I want more of this world, more of the rebels, more Fortuna. Please give us more!

[Genesis Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

For someone that doesn’t do fantasy I completely finish this on a day . This book had a great plot the world building was amazing and it make me part of it , I actually could imagine the place and lasting the character development was French kisses 😘 There was never a moment where I was feeling like it drag , like I actually wanted more ! And thank God she confirmed that it would be more books in this amazing series . Honestly this is what I talk about when reading fantasy . . From start to finish I was pulled into the world and it just amazing. Truda is now my hero 💕‼️😘

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow burn and intriguing.

It was a interesting world were females evolved and men didn't. I like that it wasn't a instant love and the plot was good. It was really good but I felt like something was missing. It was a tearjerker at some points for me. Beautiful.