Hi guys, this is our book review for The Cruel Prince and a little overview of what happened when we went to the book signing. Hope you guys enjoy it 🙂 – Caroline and Jen x
The Cruel Prince review and Holly Black book signing:
Caroline-
“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 love anything to do with Faerie so I knew I was going to dive right into this book.
I honestly loved it so much!
Jude who is human sees her parents murdered by a Faerie who turns out to be her older sisters father, and she is brought to the world of Faerie. This world is completely unknown to Jude and she’s trying to figure out how to survive in it and how to protect the ones she loves most.
In this story we see a lot of ways that love is different. Jude comes to love the man that killed her parents as he is now the only parent she knows, and in a way he loves them all as well.
From the start it is a suspenseful thrill ride with twists and turns, deception, love and betrayal.
We see lots of different characters with lots of different character traits and it’s hard to figure out who is genuine and who isn’t. They all have their own game that they play and it’s intriguing to find out how it will play out.
With a Cruel Prince like Cardan in the story-who we hate to love at first but then I completely fell in love with- it adds intrigue into the story and we see many different sides to him. I completely fell in love with him and this story and I’d say many others did as well!
I need the next book immediately, Holly Black is a Queen.
Jennifer-
The Cruel Prince opens with a brutal murder taking place. Jude and her sisters are witness to their parents being killed my non other than Vivi’s biological father, Madoc. Madoc wants his daughter to come live with him in the world of faerie. Realizing that he’s left the other two girls without parents he now has to bring them along to live in a world that’s isn’t their own. Mortals in a world with the majority of the population being faeries? Not a great mix. Jude and her sister Taryn are mocked and tormented constantly by some of their classmates. In order to survive in this new world full of danger, betrayal, politics and treachery Jude comes to terms with needing to be just as smart and deceitful as the fey themselves.
I absolutely adore this magical world and characters which Holly Black has so cleverly created. That woman is a genius I swear! The storytelling in this book was amazing and transported me to a completely different place which is what I especially love about fantasy worlds like this. I was so impressed with the writing style and how it was told through Jude’s perspective as a mortal in the world of faerie.
I liked how romance wasn’t the main focus but was an underlying factor within the story.
What I most enjoyed was the political aspect within the courts and how certain people within them would be willing to do anything for power. We see some characters work together behind others backs but it isn’t what you think in some cases. The ending of this story was such an unexpected turn for me which I quite enjoyed.
Holly Black book signing-
We went to the Holly Black signing for The Cruel Prince the 22nd of March, in Easons in Dublin. It was so nice to hear her talking about the book and what her inspiration is for writing. People were able to ask her questions about The Cruel Prince and her other books and it was great to hear what she had to say.
While we were waiting to get our book signed, the lovely people of Easons gave us free book merch, which consisted of; a snippet of her next book in the series- The Wicked King, a black candle (that smells amazing!), black heart lollipops, a bookmark and a small postcard size painting. Who doesn’t love free book merch though! We were able to get an individual picture with her after we got our book signed and a group one of both of us with her to show you guys on this!:) It was such a great evening, and she has fabulous blue hair!!
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