Dire Bound by Sable Sorensen

Direbound by Sable Sorensen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - 1 day

Pages - 605

Publisher -

Source - Bought

Blurb from Goodreads

Only the worthy survive the Bonding Trials. She’ll risk her life—and her heart—to be one of them…

Meryn Cooper has never dreamed of being one of the Bonded, the King’s elite warriors who form mental links with massive, vicious direwolves. She’s made peace with her life scraping by in poverty in the shadows of the castle. But then her younger sister Saela is kidnapped, stolen across the border by the immortal monsters her country has spent centuries fighting.

And Meryn’s world falls apart.

Desperate to cross the front and save her sister, Meryn enlists in the army—only to discover that there are Bonding Trials this year, where all soldiers are forced to risk their lives in an attempt to connect with a direwolf. It’s too late to turn back; Meryn is thrown into the deadly competition against her will.

Now, she’ll need to survive the next four months of training at the castle if she wants a chance of finding Saela. Everything here is a test, from the brutal classes where one mistake means death, to the glittering court parties where every smile hides a knife.

To make things worse, Meryn is bound to a feral direwolf who refuses to communicate. The other trainees would love to spill her common blood. And her gorgeous instructor, Stark Therion, is as malicious as the wolves himself.

Everyone is out to get her—everyone but the dangerously handsome crown prince, Killian Valtiere. But if she loses her heart to him, she may also lose her life.

And the castle is hiding dark secrets…
My Review

Poverty is rife, kids are being taken for God knows what purpose, royalty come through the poverty stricken communities on their huge dire wolves, it sickens Meryn. She is fighting grown dangerous men for money to keep herself, sister and mother safe/fed. Meryn has always had that something and a local helped her hone and focus her anger and skills so she is a walking weapon. All she cares about is her family and her beau. When Meryns sister is kidnapped she has no choice but to go forward to try for the bonding trials, it is the only way she can try and get her sister back. Everything is against Meryn, she is poor, she is ill prepared, some of the richest and well trained kids are up for this, born for it. Even if you get through the process you still need to survive the journey to where the dire wolves are, there are hundreds of competitors and maybe one hundred ish wolves, they pick you. Meryn will stop at nothing to get her sister back, not fail at whatever is thrown at her, not bow down and she won't die because her sister is depending on her if it isn't already too late!

AHHHHHHH YOU GUYS so firstly, hello beautiful book map! Loads of characters and the book gives me vibes of Fourth Wing meets Game of Thrones meets The Hunger Games all smooshed together to give us Dire Bound. Absolutely raging I need to wait til May to get book two! I have had readers block on and off for ages, I sank this in almost one sitting!

The journey to the wolves is very echoy of Fourth Wing/hunger games, every man for himself, dirty tactics allowed, actually anything goes, as long as you make it. Meryn is a kick ass main character, she knows how to handle herself and can take down guys twice her size/weight. The trainors/mentors seem to have an issue with her because of her background and to be fair she has an attitude too. The dire wolves I LOVE, especially the sassy feral one that bounds to Meryn pah ha ha, there is attitudes all around.

There was some moments I wanted to shake Meryn, I get it, she is going through it but damn girl stop making a rod for your own back. I totally get why this isn't for everyone but I absolutely loved it. There is death, fighting, bonding, trials, murder, skulduggery, shady as people, loyalty, betrayal oh and spicy scenes too. The book has a whole lot of everything and some of the echos of the other series was a bit on the nose *cough Stark cough* but I really liked it, one of my fave reads this year guys, 5/5! Hurry up May for book two!

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