Full disclosure: Zoe is an online friend.
Short version before:
Penny Sterling is just eight when her mother Jane fulfills a pact made before her birth. Given to Nicholas Rumpelstilts, Penny is told she will serve as a child bride. But once he has his prize alone, Nicholas treats Penny like gold, granting her access to her mother, friends, and a quiet life with a private bedroom. Nicholas promises never to lie, but it doesn’t mean he isn’t keeping secrets...
Short version after:
Eight-year-old Penny Sterling's mother promised her to Nicholas Rumpelstilts before her birth. When she becomes his child bride, she fears the worst but he leaves her alone and treats her kindly. As she grows up, Penny develops magical powers that put her in danger, and Nicholas protects and comforts her. When he disappears she must choose between her freedom and her growing love for her captor.
Long version before:
Penny Sterling is just eight when her mother Jane fulfills a pact made before her birth. Given to Nicholas Rumpelstilts, Penny is told she will serve as a child bride. But once he has his prize alone, Nicholas treats Penny like gold, granting her access to her mother, friends, and a quiet life with a private bedroom. Nicholas promises never to lie, but it doesn’t mean he isn’t keeping secrets...
Penny begins to have strange feelings and thoughts which are not her own. With her abilities manifesting, Nicholas entrusts Penny with a secret she can’t share with Jane: magic is real, and Penny is a developing witch. Her powers expose her to many dangerous creatures, but they also bring her closer to an extended family she never knew she had. Penny learns how her kind are seen as monsters by normal humans, and she encounters a real monster who leaves her with scars, both physical and emotional. With these exposures to the harsh realities of her dual life, Nicholas no longer seems so terrible, and Penny comes to love him. Despite the warnings of her friends not to do anything hasty, Penny crosses another boundary and allows Nicholas to become her lover.
When Nicholas disappears, Penny panics and uses what little training she has to search for him. In the process, she exposes herself to her closest friends and makes a deal that threatens her life as well as the safety of her mother and Jane’s new husband.
A dark fantasy exploring themes of child brides and Stockholm syndrome, Penny for Your Debts contains graphic violence and sexual situations, and should not be read by anyone under the age of eighteen.
Long version after:
When eight-year-old Penny Sterling becomes the child bride of Nicholas Rumpelstits, she expects the worst. Instead, she's free to go to school, to have friends, even to see the mother who gave her to Nicholas before her birth--and her new husband never lays a hand on her. But however pleasant the cage, she's still a prisoner.
As Penny grows, she learns why Nicholas may want her: she's a witch. She must hide her abilities or risk the world's fear and hatred. Penny always thought Nicholas was the monster, but when a real monster leaves her scarred emotionally and physically he is the one who offers safety and comfort in a world where she's likely to find neither.
When Nicholas disappears in dangerous circumstances, Penny faces a hard choice: take her freedom, or search for a captor she's come to love.
A dark fantasy exploring themes of child marriage and Stockholm syndrome, Penny for Your Debts contains graphic violence and sexual situations, and should not be read by anyone under the age of eighteen.
I like the long version after the best. It draws me in more, showing me the choices, but I still don't know which she'd make.
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