A review by heathland
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

If you're wanting to read this book expecting it to be romantic, it's not. It's a political fantasy with a smidgen of romance. As in, if it was removed from the book entirely, it wouldn't change very much about the plot.

I have mixed but more positive feelings about this book. 
At the beginning I was enjoying it a lot, the set up was gripping and the world building brilliant.
But as the plot developed it got quite muddled for me. I spent a lot of time getting confused by all the names and struggling to remember what exactly was happening, who hated who, and why they were even doing what they were doing.

At first I didn't like the main character, Jude, because I just couldn't wrap my head around her thought process. But at some point in the middle I decided to not think about understanding her too much and I enjoyed the book a lot more from then on.

The ending quarter had me hooked though, when all the set up and confusing things we've learned along the way finally start piecing themselves together and though I did predict the twist, it was still a great ending I'd say.

I went into this book expecting it to be romance centred so I think my confusion and early disinterest came from hesitance to read a political focus book, but I'm glad I stuck with it.
The writing is very good and gripping, so whilst the story itself was not my cup of tea, I didn't want to stop reading because it's a very well written book.

In conclusion, I think I would read this again... but I am going to go out and buy the next book in the series, so that has to count for something.

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