Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.
I am not normally a YA fantasy reader. I really enjoy children's fantasy, but YA just never quite seems to push my buttons but, in the middle of a stressful few weeks of my MA, I just felt like I wanted something fun and low stakes to read. So I just picked up the first YA fantasy book that caught my eye and I'm really glad that I did.
This novel centres around Jude, a mortal taken with her siblings to be raised in fairyland for reasons I won't spoil. The Fairy Folk aren't the cutesy twinkly flower garden type, this fairyland is full of war, politics, drunken parties and trickery. Think the Artemis Fowl Faeries with an overlay of Game of Thrones. We follow Jude as she navigates growing up mortal, and therefore considered lesser, as she tries to establish herself in a land to which she does not belong.
Jude is an interesting character, and probably one of my favourite elements of this book. She is a little annoying and repetitive BUT she is also assertive, resourceful, and effective. She isn't just a pair of eyes and a teenage sex drive being steered around for the reader's convenience, she has goals and interests and makes decisions that shape the plot.
Another thing that I enjoyed was the constant presence of the mortal world. The world of fairies and the world of humans seem to exist on either side of a thin permeable membrane, so it's entirely possible to cross from one to the other, and Jude and her sisters are constantly conflicted about where they truly belong. That tension between the options of being lesser in a magical world, or normal in a safe one, resonates throughout the novel and creates this added layer that gives the story a heartfelt tension.
This book isn't perfect, there were a few decisions that felt jarring to me: At one point a character commits a spontaneous murder, buries the body, then attends a party where their main concern is that their love interest is flirting with other people. I would have thought the MURDER would weigh on someone's mind a little more but then again I've never killed someone. Also the romance... We see it coming a mile away lads, and when it arrives it's just a little clunky, and distracts from a pivotal moment in the plot. I like who Black pairs together and I think it was a great decision to bring the two characters together in the way that she did, but I really think I would have been fine with just a glimmer of romance in this book, to be explored organically in later books, rather than tacked into this one.
These issues really didn't detract from what a beautiful world Black constructs. Elfhame is full of little details that create this incredibly rich, sumptuous feeling. The descriptions of the beautiful dresses, the twisted complex rules of the Folk that Jude navigates, and these unbearably beautiful, inhuman creatures. Its these little bits that make The Cruel Prince a compelling and immersive experience.
Overall I really did like this book. It's a pacey, engaging read, but with enough substance to be really satisfying, and Black gives us delicious tidbits of larger parts of the fairy world that I really hope will be explored later on. I'm looking forward to the next installment.
Have you read The Cruel Prince? What did you think?
Thank you for reading!
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black was published by Hot Key Books in 2018.
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