To Cage a Wild Bird Summary, Review and Ending Explained

Thank you to Avon, Harper Voyager and NetGalley for the advanced review copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

To Cage a Wild Bird by Brooke Fast is a dystopian romance set in Dividium, a nation divided into three tiers where criminals are sent to Endlock, a prison where the wealthy hunt inmates for sport. After her younger brother Jed is taken to Endlock for defending himself, Dividium’s most notorious bounty hunter Raven Thorne agrees to The Collective’s offer to get into the prison and escape with Jed and one of their own. Except what she doesn’t expect is to find friends she can’t fathom leaving behind and a prison guard she can’t seem to stay away from.

I enjoyed this! It’s like a popcorn thriller: captivating, fun and bingeable. There are some plot holes, like how do prisoners have so much leeway to wander around the prison or why there aren’t any cameras in the hunting grounds, but it’s definitely enjoyable. I found the romance a bit over the top at times but overall would read the next installment to see where it goes!

Read our full summary and review of To Cage a Wild Bird below. This post contains spoilers.

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Tropes

• Dystopian
• Forced Proximity
• Forbidden Romance
• Found Family

Review

Overall Impressions 😊

This was a good time! Bingeable, fun, like watching an action thriller. Was I able to poke a bunch of holes into the story if I thought about it? Absolutely. Did I try to? No, I was in this for the vibes and the ride. It was an easy read. I didn’t realize how 400 pages passed me by and at the end of the day that’s what I want from a book sometimes: distract me long enough from life!

I was entertained. I liked the found family and I’m intrigued by the next book. The society setup is what you’d expect from a dystopian story that takes prison for profit to a whole new level. It’s an intriguing concept but not super original. Overall it’s exciting and a good time even though the romance was a bit over the top and the spice felt misplaced.

Perfect For Fans Of… 🧭

This is like a grown up Divergent x Hunger Games meets, wait for it, Orange is the New Black. It’s a mix of prison break and dystopian with enough captivating plot elements to keep you hooked.

If you like a strong, take charge FMC, especially a capable, caregiving eldest daughter type, and a forbidden romance in close proximity, this one’s for you.
Whether you want to binge a book instead of a season on Netflix or read before bed , this is a good time. If you’re looking for something easy and fun between heavier reads, this is it.

Characters 👥

Raven feels like the edgy, stereotypical eldest daughter you see in a lot of dystopian romances. Caregiving, capable, very skilled in combat (they always are) and has a heart of steel. There’s nothing wrong with that. She’s fun to read about, but there’s nothing really new about her either.

Vale is the noble MMC: hot for the FMC from the start, has a secret, trying to do the right thing, has good friends, is capable and grounded, and great in the romance. Again, nothing wrong with it, it’s a good time.

The side characters are nice. Momo, August, Kit, Yara and Jed make a great found family and I hope we get to see more of them in the next book. August’s ending was sad but felt predictable. The moment they said he was the longest surviving member of Endlock, I kind of saw it coming.

One thing I did appreciate is the Raven and Jed dynamic. Raven’s overprotective of Jed, and Jed’s trying to become his own person and get Raven to lean on him. Instead of the usual thing where the older sibling agrees superficially and still does everything alone, Raven actually lets Jed help her, which is a nice touch.

Perri, Larch and the Council are readable villains. Nothing that’ll keep you up at night but they serve the story

Overall the characters are familiar archetypes. They’re not groundbreaking, but they work for this kind of book and they’re fun to follow along with.

Plot 🗺️

The story is predictable but ultimately a great time. Prison break stories are always fun to read and this one keeps you moving.

That said, I did feel like it was pretty linear. Raven and the group just magically find the solutions they need when they need them. There’s also quite a bit of exposition. When Raven arrives at the prison she watches the history of Dividium, kind of like the Hunger Games intro video, and I wish we were left to figure out the world on our own instead.

I wish there were bigger secrets. The food shortage reveal and Kit’s involvement in building Endlock’s systems felt like they should have been bigger moments. I also don’t really understand why The Collective would go as far as they did to save Kit, especially when they can walk in and out of the prison the way they please. If Graylin can sneak into the kitchen and deliver goods, why do they need Raven in there at all?

Perri is set up as this big antagonist but after her second fight with Raven she just disappears. The iron root plan to knock everyone out is great in theory, but they really didn’t consider that someone in the prison might be consuming it? The plot holes are endless if you think about them too hard, but honestly the story is fun enough that you don’t want to.

Vale and Raven’s romance is steady. I do wish there were more bumps and definitely more yearning and tension but it was fine.

I’m looking forward to the next book. I’m curious how the separation between Vale and Raven will be handled (I am begging for a multi POV storyline, please) and I’m a sucker for love triangles which Graylin, Raven and Vale are definitely headed toward.

Writing Style and Narration ✍️

The writing is easy to approach. The setting is modern so the whole novel is pretty conversational. The tone is consistent with gritty, starving dystopian societies and it fits the world well.

Where it lost me a bit was the dialogue, especially between Raven and Vale. He says stuff like “you lit me on fire” and calls her “Little Bird” the entire book. Any nickname with the “Little” prefix gives me the ick. It reads fine in theory but nobody would ever say any of that in real life.

On the spice side, there are three spicy scenes and I think we could have done with one or none. There was such an opportunity in this book for stolen glances, brushing fingers and a maybe kiss, and I wish it had left it at that. It would have made the ending pack an even bigger punch. The tension could’ve been so good but felt rushed.

Synopsis

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The World of Endlock

Raven lives in a society divided into three tiers: Lower, Metal, and Upper. Three councilmen oversee the regions, one for each. If someone commits a crime, they’re sent to Endlock, a prison where inmates are hunted by the wealthy, known as the Guests.

Raven takes care of her younger brother Jed by working as a bounty hunter. She tracks down criminals, turns them into Endlock, and collects credits in return. She turns in her current prisoner, Torren, who is from the upper class, and gets her payout.

Jed has recently turned 18, and it’s just the two of them. Their parents were rebels who worked for an underground organization called The Collective, and they were executed for it. Now that Jed is 18, he has to take a job at the water filtering system. He wants to join The Collective like their parents did, but Raven won’t let him.

One night after a job, Raven is at a bar and hooks up with a guy who’s clearly from the middle or upper section. When they run into guards during curfew, the guy, Vale, flashes them something Raven doesn’t see, and she realizes he’s a guard. She punches him and runs.

When she gets home, one of The Collective members who’s been trying to recruit her tells her that Jed was taken to Endlock. He was attacked by the children of an upper councilman, specifically the brother of one of the prisoners Raven turned in. When Jed defended himself, he was automatically considered a criminal and taken to Endlock.

The Collective makes her an offer: get into Endlock, help her brother, and help one of their own escape. They won’t tell her who that person is. Raven reluctantly agrees. The next morning, they stage a robbery, Raven is arrested, and she’s sent to Endlock.

Raven’s First Days Inside Endlock

In Endlock, Raven is strip searched, dehumanized, given a jumpsuit, the number 224, and a rank of three. She meets August, the longest running inmate in Endlock. When she asks him about Kit, the person she’s supposed to make contact with, August says he’ll introduce her the next day.

The prisoners already hate her because they know she’s a bounty hunter. And when she’s branded with her number, the person doing it is Vale, the same guy from the bar. He’s a prison guard. Raven is disgusted.

Back in her cell, she’s alone and wants to find Jed. August tells her he knows her brother, but because Raven punched the rich guy’s son, Jed’s not going to have an easy time in here. Raven is overprotective of Jed, so that hits her hard.

She meets the rest of the group at the dining hall: Momo, a 12 year old who stole food for his family and ended up in Endlock; Kit, the person she’s supposed to help escape; and Yara, Kit’s girlfriend. They all welcome her except Yara, who’s reluctant. They explain the hunts and tell her Momo is never allowed to watch them. Raven just needs to keep her head down and survive. Each hunt selects 10 people, but lately fewer and fewer are being picked and nobody knows why. They also tell her Jed is in a different cell block.

The next day, Raven is selected for a hunt. Jed is there too. She runs to him, tells him to hide, and puts him up in a tree while she scouts the arena to figure out how they’ll eventually escape.

The hunt is set up battle royale style. The circle keeps shrinking and the hunters close in. Jed is in the tree and Raven climbs up behind him, but then she sees Momo cornered by a hunter. Even though interfering is illegal, Raven drops behind the hunter, knocks him out, and stashes his gun for later. She, Momo, and Jed run for the center of the circle where there’s a blood tree. Touch it, and you’re safe.

As they’re waiting in the final circle, she sees August sitting calmly at the center of the tree. He makes eye contact with Raven and tells them to run. They touch the tree and Raven barely makes it. They also watch Torren die at the hands of Verona, a seasoned hunter.

As everyone disperses after the hunt, Raven catches August and Vale having a hushed conversation like they know each other. During the hunt itself, Vale also helped Raven escape a huntress on his own, which hints that he’s more than just a guard.

Raven Gains the Group’s Trust

After the hunt, everyone thanks Raven for saving Momo. They assumed a bounty hunter would only look out for herself, so the fact that she helped changes how they see her. They start warming up to her.

They also reveal the real plan: they’re all escaping together, not just Kit. Kit is the engineer who designed Endlock’s security system, the wristbands, all of it. That’s why The Collective wants her out. August, Momo, and Yara aren’t valuable to The Collective on their own, but they’re a package deal. August is a doctor, so the North Settlement will take them too.

Back in her cell, Jed comes to see her. He tells her he’s grateful for everything she’s done, but he brings up the day their family died. We find out that Raven told a school friend about their parents’ involvement with the rebels, thinking she could trust them. That friend turned them in. So Raven has been carrying the guilt of accidentally getting her family killed. Jed tells her he doesn’t want her carrying that burden anymore. He just wants her to be his sister. Raven agrees.

Vale moves Jed to Raven’s cell block and lunch schedule. That’s when Raven puts it together: this is why August and Vale were whispering like old friends. They knew each other before Endlock. August was working as a doctor in a clinic and Vale was a medical student there. They weren’t mentor and mentee, but they became close.

Larch, the warden, tells Raven he knows she’s the one who hit the guard. He throws her in solitary confinement.

One of the worst guards shows up and is about to assault Raven when Vale interrupts. Raven asks Vale if he’s a rebel. He says no. But his father was a rebel and his mother is a councilwoman. He wanted to help people without drawing his mother’s attention, so he took the guard job. He’s basically a double agent. He starts sneaking Raven food.

After about a week in solitary, Vale gets her assigned to the workshop. Raven realizes she can get wire cutters there to cut the fence. He also lets her take a private shower in the guards’ quarters. When someone nearly walks in, Vale steps into the shower with her, a towel around Raven, and they share a tense, almost intimate moment before he disappears.

Raven visits Kit in the workshop and finds out she’s an engineer. Kit shows her the space, and Raven sneaks out a wire cutter.

While working in the workshop, Raven also discovers that Endlock isn’t making much profit. Vale was in the room when Larch met with the board, and they discussed making the hunts more enticing. So they add obstacles the prisoners don’t know about. Vale warns August and Raven ahead of time so they can prepare.

The Fence, Cyril’s Death, and Perri’s Revenge

During the next hunt, Raven and the group approach the fence, but Perri and her lover Cyril find them. They demand to escape with them too. A fight breaks out. Raven is fighting Perri, but someone pushes toward the fence without realizing it’s electrified. Cyril dies. Perri is devastated and swears revenge.

After that, Kit tells Raven she needs her to steal a tablet. Raven writes to Graylin, and Graylin tells her absolutely not.

Mort, a guard, also dies from the electric fence. Someone threw him into it and nobody knows why.

That night, Raven discovers their cells have been unlocked. She barricades her door but hears yelping next door. Perri snuck into August’s room and broke his ankle. Momo is sent to get Vale, and when he shows up with him, Momo is crying because he’s scared. He’s 12. When Vale sees August, his fear is obvious. These two are closer than they let on.

They take August to the infirmary and set his leg. While that’s happening, Raven and Vale slip into an empty room. They kiss.

The next hunt comes around. Jed is selected and so is Raven. They run into Vale while carrying August, whose ankle is still broken, and Vale shows them underground tunnels beneath the arena.

More of Vale and August’s history comes out here. Even though Vale isn’t part of The Collective, he helps people who need it. When August was arrested because a patient died of a heart attack he couldn’t have prevented, Vale got himself a guard position at Endlock.

Vale also tells them that the lower sector’s food shortage is fake. It’s an artificially created famine designed to push people into committing more crimes so they end up in the prison. He tells them he’s going to help them escape.

They make it to the blood tree, but Raven gets stabbed in the hand when she falls through some stairs. Vale takes her to the infirmary and stitches her up. They’re intimate in front of the blinking cameras without realizing it, and afterwards they worry they’ve given each other away.

Perri attacks Raven in the bathrooms. Raven is alone this time. She takes a cut to the face but manages to take Perri down. There’s a lot of blood, so she tells the guards they should check on Perri since nobody was watching.

Vale finds Raven and is worried. He takes her to a closet and they nearly hook up but get interrupted. He tells her the hunters have been enjoying watching prisoners get hurt on their own, so now there are even more trenches and traps built into the ground for entertainment.

Planning the Escape From Endlock

The Councilwoman Elder arrives and is joining the next hunt. Before that, Vale and August tell Raven about tunnels beneath the arena they can use to get out.

They decide to map the rest of the tunnels. Raven realizes they need to get everyone out, so she writes to Graylin asking for respirators and a sleeping potion. Graylin sneaks into the kitchen of the arena to deliver the goods. Raven hugs him, which surprises him because they’ve been fighting for years over her refusal to join The Collective. Graylin clearly still has feelings for her.

Vale walks in, sees them being friendly, and gets jealous. There’s a bit of a pissing contest, but in the end Vale thanks Graylin for smuggling in what they need. Graylin nods and says he’ll escort them to the North Settlement.

After Graylin leaves, Vale and Raven hook up in the freezer.

Later, Raven overhears August and Vale discussing when the right time is to tell Raven “the truth,” but she doesn’t get a chance to push it.

Raven has a dream where she remembers the cemetery in the arena has an empty spot in the middle, suggesting a tunnel underneath. Larch is adding upgrades that hunters can buy, so Raven and August volunteer to test them. Vale, August, and Raven go into the arena, find the tunnel, and then Vale has to test the new mechanics on them. Both August and Raven pass out. Raven is furious.

The next hunt arrives and Raven gets herself selected. Councilwoman Elder picks her personally and tells her she knew her parents, she knows about the two strikes on her back, and that her son works in the prison. Raven puts it together: Vale. Valorian Elder. He’s the councilwoman’s son.

She’s devastated that he kept this from her. She’s distracted by the whole thing.

Vale tells her that morning they dug new trenches. Raven acknowledges it, but when they go into the field with August, she forgets to warn him about the new traps. She’s still processing what she just learned about Vale.

August falls into a trench and breaks his ankle again. He tells Raven he won’t survive this, but he wants to take the councilwoman down with him. He asks Raven to push the councilwoman into the trench on top of him. Raven blames herself for not warning Gus about the trenches. She feels terrible because the omission happened while she was distracted. But August makes her promise she’ll look after Momo the same way she looks after Jed. He tells her this isn’t her fault and he was never going to make it out.

Raven pushes the councilwoman into the hole, but not before she shoots August. Vale arrives after. The councilwoman survives but is badly wounded. Raven is taken to the infirmary with a concussion and the hunt is canceled.

Raven confronts Vale about being the councilwoman’s son. Vale tells her that his mom being who she is doesn’t make him the same person. Raven says she needs more time. She falls asleep in the infirmary.

To Cage a Wild Bird Ending Explained

Raven spends her days in a haze, blaming herself for Gus’ death.

Then Jed is selected for a hunt and that pulls her out of it. She tries to get herself selected too but can’t. Jed survives.

The escape is getting closer. Kit and Raven work on the tablet in Vale’s room to disable the wristbands. Kit leaves, and after talking with her, Raven is ready to forgive Vale. She does, and they sleep together.

A few days later, Vale asks Raven to brand him with a prisoner mark so the North Settlement won’t know he was a guard.

The night of the escape arrives. They sneak out of their cells, use the iron root tonic through the ventilator systems to put everyone to sleep, and head through the hunting grounds into the tunnels.

Larch discovers them. He smokes iron root himself, so the tonic doesn’t affect him. He threatens Raven’s life to get to Vale. Everyone sneaks up on Larch, attacks him, and Raven kills him.

Vale and Jed split from the group to distract the guards. Larch gave the command before he died to have a doctor create an antidote to wake the guards from the iron root, so the guards are starting to come to.

When they return, Vale is gravely injured. He can’t make the trip. He tells Raven they need to go. He’s about to tell her he loves her, but Raven stops him. She tells him he can’t say that. He just needs to follow them when he’s better.

Kit and Raven realize the weight of what they’ve started is bigger than this escape. They need to bring down the entire Council.

They make it out. Vale stays behind with Larch dead. His cover story is that he tried to stop them and got hurt.

Raven, Jed, Yara, Kit, and Momo leave Endlock. They run into Graylin. He and Raven hug, and they begin making their way to the North Settlement.

Spicy Chapters

Is To Cage a Wild Bird spicy?

Yes. We rated it 🌶️🌶️🌶️ peppers!

• Chapter 21
• Chapter 24
• Chapter 29

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