The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

Title: The Cruel Prince

Author: Holly Black

Series: The Folk of the Air #1

Pages: 370 pages

Format: Hardback

Source: Own

My Rating: 4.5 stars

Synopsis

Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.

And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest. I hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.

Jude was seven when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.

To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.

As Jude becomes more deeply embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, she discovers her own capacity for trickery and bloodshed. But as betrayal threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.

My Thoughts

This was my first Holly Black book and after reading this I definitely want to read more of her books. I feel like I don’t read a whole lot of fantasy but every time I do read a fantasy I tend to end up loving it and that was definitely the case for this book.

Let me start off with the things that kind of bothered me. First off how did Madoc know where to find the girls mother? She’s been in hiding for like 10 years and now all of a sudden he knows where she is. I would have liked a little more explanation. Also I find it hard to believe that he would take 2 human girls back to his land to raise as his own just because they belonged to his wife. I mean the whole book pretty much tells you how much the fae hate humans.

Ok now that that is out of the way lets talk about Prince Cardan. He is awful. People were telling me to just wait he will grow on you and honestly he really didn’t. Yes he did somewhat redeem himself but that doesn’t excuse his behavior at all. That being said he is a great villain.

I loved Vivi and I wished she had a more prominent part in the story. Taryn who is Jude’s twin umm I don’t even know what to say about her. At first I was liking her but that quickly took a turn and right now I can’t stand her.

I was preparing myself for this crazy cliffhanger because everybody kept warning me it was coming. If you know me you know I hate cliffhangers but I was really happy with the way this book ends. I definitely want to read the next book as soon as possible because I want to know what’s in store for these characters next.