To start my review, I for the most part found this book interesting. I saw the idea, and could feel the potential that it had. I picked up this book because of the raving reviews and high amount of 5 stars that it had received since its release.
With the idea and premise of the book I went in thinking it was like another solid story from Virgil, and Annabelle Hawthrone such as Master Class, and I didn’t get that at all.
Unbridled presents itself as a Romance for Men book, even on Amazon it is listed under action/adventure romance, and men’s adventure fiction, and I didn’t get any of that from this story.
The book is great, enjoyable overall but I would not claim this as a Romance for Men book, but a coming of age story for the main character's adoptive daughter: his niece Happy Miracle.
The book follows the story of Martin Smith, a seemingly unremarkable man who has spent the majority of his life taking care of what little family he had left as misfortune kept rearing its dark head. First he had to raise his sister, abandoning his personal education to make sure she had all that she needed, and then his niece Happy Miracle after her mother, his sister died as well. Martin Smith devoted a full 13 years of his life to raising this little miracle of an Equine Maiden, or simply put horse girl. Putting his skills and education in building magical devices to build items like a pair of glasses to read her ability and stats to help Happy Miracle fulfill the dream of every horse girl. Running, and racing, putting everything on the track, and his niece's dream of being one of the very best, like no one ever was. And they were in this first book, thanks to a lucky turn and them both being scouted. Happy Miracle for her skill as a racer and Martin for his as a trainer.
From here I will start my full review including light spoilers for the story, so please be prepared.
From the set up and the plot I had high hopes for this story, with Martin being skilled at a craft that would draw the attention and envy of others to help make the other horse girls excel at their career, while overseeing his daughter's growth in an environment meant to help her bloom. An in return see the relationship of these two come through, the care and attention that went into shaping their relationship into that of a real father and daughter as he not only encourages her growth, but those of her new peers, showing Happy MIrcale living up to the potential she and her father figure have trained and Martin finding love around the way. The story does some of that.
Before I get into the negative I will have to start with the positive as it is only right to do. Unbridle may not be a RFM book in my opinion, but it settles well as a coming of age story for Happy Miracle. As we the reader spend quite a bit of time with her and her personal ongoing in the story. I was more heavily invested with each page of her story. The bitterness she felt after her Uncle(father) left her to the wayside to be impartial and the sudden ache that made her feel in her heart believing the only family she knew didn’t love her that much and the intense rivalry she had with her perceived antagonist “See You Next Tuesday” who she thought was trying to take away her father and be snarky about it. The way this was written, the camaraderie with the student horse girls, their little rivalry, and the bitter drive to win and one up each other did remind me greatly of the source material.
Another stand out story that I was heavily interested in was the rival “See you Next Tuesday” and her mother “Spring Loaded” relationship through the story. How broken and messed up it was, and how “See You Next Tuesday” had latched onto Martin as a father figure as well considering she was an adopted orphan. Which was another misunderstanding that made the rivalry between Tuesday and Happy Miracle that more interesting as each other though they had the better upbringing and life.
Considering this book was written by two authors, I can say for certain the plot around the rivalry, and the emotional highpoints of the story when they landed definitely came from Annabelle Hawkthrone. I’ve read enough of her book to see where she had her hand in the story.
An that is all the good I have to say about the book. The Horse Girl students journey through the story.
Now for the bad. I’ve listed all the good points from the story, and if it isn’t hard to tell from what I’ve had to talk about is the main character himself, Martin. The book likes to constantly remind us in blaring detail about the tragedy that has fallen upon this man's life. Sometimes taking up multiple paragraphs in different chapters to say the same thing over and over again. Its a constant that to me seems to be a tool to add more page count, because there wasn’t a line in the book like.
“An I told her my story. The same one that brought me pain in my life, and put me in the situation to raise Happy Miracle"
No, we got the full retailing over and over again until it stopped coming up in the book. It makes me wonder if there was any editor that gave this book a look over before its release, but with how quickly a Virgil Knightly joint comes out I do not think there is an editor.
The relationships were also quite shallow as well. There are 4 women that surround Martin and I stress women. They are also Horse girls for the school he is a trainer at, and they are teachers. Of course considering the rest of the cast are 13 year old girls, the romance has to come from one of the teachers. And the summary of those relationships could barely be called romantic. The two leading ladies that are Martin romantic partners for this book are "Unconditional Love” referred to as Lovey and “Wondrous Weekend.”
These two are the teachers that get to spend the most time with Martin. An that time spent you’d expect it would do something to further their emotional connection, but no not really. Wonderous Weekend likes Martin solely for the fact she thinks he would be a good father, and the moment she fell in love with him wasn’t seeing him interact with her daughter or the other students. No it was watching him being a guy with other guys and her thought was when she watched him guiding young men. “Wow he should have sons. I should fix that” while she rubs her tummy where the womb is. That was it, and then she starts to pursue him for more.
Lovey is the worst in my opinion because her affection has nothing to do with her interest or anything. Lovey in this lovely story is the trainer for mangagraph reading and skill development. You would think a horse girl who made this her profession would be interested in talking shop with a human who somehow made a pair of magical glasses that can read the small details that no other trainer could see without specialized equipment. She would ask Martin about his craft, how he did it, and how this reflected on his niece in training her. No, no such conversation. No chapter or two dedicated to Lovey and Martin discussing the finer points of this important skill set and cementing a reason why she would be in love with Martin outside of him being the only viable human male around.
The extreme lack of romance progression is one huge flaw for the book, and this can't really be helped since the story of the book really focuses on the Happy Miracle story and her horse girl racing plot. Which I think takes up about actually 80% of the story. , but another one that stands out the most is the relationship between the MC, and his daughter-niece Happy Miracle. Martin was a man who gave up everything to raise his sister, and now his niece.
And the moment he starts to work as a trainer at her school beside her, he immediately cuts her out of his life. They see each other, they wave at each other and he talks to her yes, but to “keep things professional and not show favoritism" he tells her they have to stay distant from each other. Then Martin proceeds to let one of the teenage horse girls call him dad, and pretty much the whole class, but when Happy Miracle tries to call him “Dad” he keeps reminding her to not call him that. Martin himself from the earliest part of the book reminds her “I am your uncle, not your father, do not call me that”. This causes an interesting situation with Happy Miracle and her plot.
Where she struggles with this new separation from the only family she has, and she is surrounded by other girls who while in good nature call him Dad. She thinks that she will lose her father figure and this reflects heavily with her rival Tuesday, and really starts to explode when Tuesday gets injured and Martin saves her and Tuesday imprints on him as a father figure as well. Oddly one of the things that puts me off with the way the plot is written, considering Unbridled is taking a lot of cues from anime and manga. The way Happy Miracle and especially Tuesday who has lived her entire life latches on to him makes it feel like the story may end up in a Usagi Drop, or If its for My Daughter, I’d even defeat a Demon lord.
For those of you who do not know, those two titles are infamous for their endings in which the MC ends up marrying his adoptive daughter by the end. In Unbridled’s case it follows the build up relationship wise as Usagi Drop, that I unintentionally kept referring to Happy Miracle as his “daughter-wife”. Especially with the way Martin actively distanced himself from her, and only had a moment of realization of this fact when as the big climax of the book Happy Miracle is in a position where she is dying. And this leads to my biggest issue and the reason why I really do not think of this book as a romance.
When our actual female lead Happy Miracle is in the hospital and dying due to her magic hurting her body. Heavy spoiler warnings from here on for the ending of the book. Martin is worried, he is concerned just like a father figure should be, and instead of going through the emotional highs of this situation. This is where the only full penetration sex scene happens. Right where Martin is dealing with the fact his daughter-niece might die, Wonderous Weekend, and Lovey decide then and there.
“Hey Martin. I know your daughter wife-niece is in a position where she is dying. BUT LET US SUCK YA OFF before the book ends, to make you feel better. Nasty horse girl sex will solve all your problems.”
The sex scene could have been anywhere in the book before this point. But it gets shoehorned in the last moment, right near the final 30 pages of the book. And the two women who say they love him, think that this is the time to get into the sack with him. With his daughter-niece laying in a hospital bed. But what do I know, considering after Martin gets off, his daughter is perfectly fine and even better and more special then before!
Really despite my gripes I was invested in the story, but this was a slap in the face.
Honestly the book in my opinion falls short of any standards of a romance, and shorter from a harem which I come to expect from Virgil Knightly and Annabelle Hawthorne. The book would have been much more enjoyable as I said before if this was more of a coming of age story, and we cut out all the “romance” in its entirety. Or go the other way. Instead of a school full of teenage girls who all have a weird obsession of calling the MC “dad” or “daddy” despite those other horse girls coming from regular families. It was a book that took place in a special college school/training ground for horse girls. Cut out the niece entirely unless Virgil has the courage to pull that trigger. And focus on the MC training the misfit horse girls or something.
I really do struggle to call this at all a romance for men book. If I was to give it a score based off of that, I’d give Unbridled at 2.5 out of 5. If it was a coming of age story focused around Happy Miracle, her trials and tribulations, doing her best to impress her uncle. I would give it a 5 out of 5 easily.