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A review by fraymyste
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
The Cruel Prince is the end-all-be-all of enemies to lovers stories. I have not known peace since I read it and its subsequent sequels and I will probably never find an enemies-to-lovers story as well written as this one. I try every day to recreate it in my own work, but Holly Black has a spark I suspect most other authors lack.
Let me be clear: this is a YA novel. The prose is not anything special for a YA novel. It's certainly not written by Laini Taylor. But Jude's voice is so strong it doesn't matter. And the tension between her and Cardan (both of the regular kind and the romantic kind) is so juicy that I honestly wouldn't care if the prose of this novel was slop. The prose is well-written, just not special. What is special is the dynamic between Jude and Cardan.
You won't find a dynamic like this anywhere else so I am begging you to please, please, read this book all the way through.
Let me be clear: this is a YA novel. The prose is not anything special for a YA novel. It's certainly not written by Laini Taylor. But Jude's voice is so strong it doesn't matter. And the tension between her and Cardan (both of the regular kind and the romantic kind) is so juicy that I honestly wouldn't care if the prose of this novel was slop. The prose is well-written, just not special. What is special is the dynamic between Jude and Cardan.
You won't find a dynamic like this anywhere else so I am begging you to please, please, read this book all the way through.