4.6
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43,345 ratings
A powerful curse forces the exiled Queen of Faerie to choose between ambition and humanity in this highly anticipated and jaw-dropping finale to The Folk of the Air trilogy from a #1 New York Times bestselling author.
He will be the destruction of the crown and the ruination of the throne
Power is much easier to acquire than it is to hold onto. Jude learned this lesson when she released her control over the wicked king, Cardan, in exchange for immeasurable power.
Now as the exiled mortal Queen of Faerie, Jude is powerless and left reeling from Cardan's betrayal. She bides her time determined to reclaim everything he took from her. Opportunity arrives in the form of her twin sister, Taryn, whose life is in peril.
Jude must risk venturing back into the treacherous Faerie Court, and confront her lingering feelings for Cardan, if she wishes to save her sister. But Elfhame is not as she left it. War is brewing. As Jude slips deep within enemy lines she becomes ensnared in the conflict's bloody politics.
And, when a dormant yet powerful curse is unleashed, panic spreads throughout the land, forcing her to choose between her ambition and her humanity . . .
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ISBN-10
0316310379
ISBN-13
978-0316310376
Print length
336 pages
Language
English
Publisher
Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date
November 23, 2020
Dimensions
5.7 x 1.2 x 8.25 inches
Item weight
2.31 pounds
This is my room, he points out, affronted. And that’s my wife.
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Jude, you can’t really think I don’t know it’s you. I knew you from the moment you walked into the brugh.
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I can’t believe he said that and then just walked out, leaving me reeling. I am going to strangle him.
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ASIN :
B07PKRXQDH
File size :
16260 KB
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Praise for The Queen of Nothing:
"Whether you came for the lore or the love, perfection." ―Kirkus, starred review
"A compelling final piece in a powerful set."―Booklist, starred review
"We're being promised a 'jaw-dropping' finale...Based on the ride she's taken readers on so far, we'd expect nothing less."―Entertainment Weekly
Praise for The Wicked King:
"A stunning and compelling sequel."― --SLJ, starred review
"A heady blend of courtly double-crossing, Faerie lore, and toxic attraction swirls together in the sequel to THE CRUEL PRINCE.... Black's writing is both contemporary and classic; her world is, at this point, intensely well-realized, so that some plot twists seem almost inevitable."―Kirkus, starred review
"[A] dangerous journey filled with mystery, betrayal, intrigue, and romance.... Larger-than-life action in a kingdom packed with self-centered, evil, and manipulating characters also doles out real life issues."―VOYA, starred review
"A rare second volume that surpasses the first, with, happily, more intrigue and passion still to come."―Booklist, starred review
Praise for The Cruel Prince:
"Lush, dangerous, a dark jewel of a book. Black's world is intoxicating, imbued with a relentless sense of peril that kept me riveted through every chapter of Jude's journey. And Jude! She is a heroine to love--brave but pragmatic, utterly human. This delicious story will seduce you and leave you desperate for just one more page."―Leigh Bardugo, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom
"I require book two immediately. Holly is the Faerie Queen."―Victoria Aveyard, #1 bestselling author of The Red Queen series
"[S]pellbinding.... Breathtaking set pieces, fully developed supporting characters, and a beguiling, tough-as-nails heroine enhance an intricate, intelligent plot that crescendos to a jaw-dropping third-act twist."―Publishers Weekly, starred review
"Another fantastic, deeply engaging, and all-consuming work from Black that belongs on all YA shelves."―School Library Journal, starred review
"Jude, who struggles with a world she both loves and hates and would rather be powerful and safe than good, is a compelling narrator. Whatever a reader is looking for--heart-in-throat action, deadly romance, double-crossing, moral complexity--this is one heck of a ride."―Booklist, starred review
"This is a heady blend of Faerie lore, high fantasy, and high school drama, dripping with description that brings the dangerous but tempting world of Faerie to life. Black is building a complex mythology; now is a great time to tune in."―Kirkus Reviews
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PROLOGUE
The Royal Astrologer, Baphen, squinted at the star chart and tried not to flinch when it seemed sure the youngest prince of Elfhame was about to be dropped on his royal head.
A week after Prince Cardan’s birth and he was finally being presented to the High King. The previous five heirs had been seen immediately, still squalling in ruddy newness, but Lady Asha had barred the High King from visiting before she felt herself suitably restored from childbed.
The baby was thin and wizened, silent, staring at Eldred with black eyes. He lashed his little whiplike tail with such force that his swaddle threatened to come apart. Lady Asha seemed unsure how to cradle him. Indeed, she held him as though she hoped someone might take the burden from her very soon.
“Tell us of his future,” the High King prompted. Only a few Folk were gathered to witness the presentation of the new prince—the mortal Val Moren, who was both Court Poet and Seneschal, and two members of the Living Council: Randalin, the Minister of Keys, and Baphen. In the empty hall, the High King’s words echoed.
Baphen hesitated, but he could do nothing save answer. Eldred had been favored with five children before Prince Cardan, shocking fecundity among the Folk, with their thin blood and few births. The stars had spoken of each little prince’s and princess’s fated accomplishments in poetry and song, in politics, in virtue, and even in vice. But this time what he’d seen in the stars had been entirely different. “Prince Cardan will be your last born child,” the Royal Astrologer said. “He will be the destruction of the crown and the ruination of the throne.”
Lady Asha sucked in a sharp breath. For the first time, she drew the child protectively closer. He squirmed in her arms. “I wonder who has influenced your interpretation of the signs. Perhaps Princess Elowyn had a hand in it. Or Prince Dain.” Maybe it would be better if she dropped him, Baphen thought unkindly.
High King Eldred ran a hand over his chin. “Can nothing be done to stop this?”
It was a mixed blessing to have the stars supply Baphen with so many riddles and so few answers. He often wished he saw things more clearly, but not this time. He bowed his head so he had an excuse not to meet the High King’s gaze. “Only out of his spilled blood can a great ruler rise, but not before what I have told you comes to pass.”
Eldred turned to Lady Asha and her child, the harbinger of ill luck. The baby was as silent as a stone, not crying or cooing, tail still lashing.
“Take the boy away,” the High King said. “Rear him as you see fit.”
Lady Asha did not flinch. “I will rear him as befits his station. He is a prince, after all, and your son.”
There was a brittleness in her tone, and Baphen was uncomfortably reminded that some prophecies are fulfilled by the very actions meant to prevent them.
For a moment, everyone stood silent. Then Eldred nodded to Val Moren, who left the dais and returned holding a slim wooden box with a pattern of roots traced over the lid.
“A gift,” said the High King, “in recognition of your contribution to the Greenbriar line.”
Val Moren opened the box, revealing an exquisite necklace of heavy emeralds. Eldred lifted them and placed them over Lady Asha’s head. He touched her cheek with the back of one hand.
“Your generosity is great, my lord,” she said, somewhat mollified. The baby clutched a stone in his little fist, staring up at his father with fathomless eyes.
“Go now and rest,” said Eldred, his voice softer. This time, she yielded.
Lady Asha departed with her head high, her grip on the child tighter. Baphen felt a shiver of some premonition that had nothing to do with stars.
High King Eldred did not visit Lady Asha again, nor did he call her to him. Perhaps he ought to have put his dissatisfaction aside and cultivated his son. But looking upon Prince Cardan was like looking into an uncertain future, and so he avoided it. Lady Asha, as the mother of a prince, found herself much in demand with the Court, if not the High King. Given to whimsy and frivolity, she wished to return to the merry life of a courtier. She couldn’t attend balls with an infant in tow, so she found a cat whose kittens were stillborn to act as his wet nurse.
That arrangement lasted until Prince Cardan was able to crawl. By then, the cat was heavy with a new litter and he’d begun to pull at her tail. She fled to the stables, abandoning him, too.
And so he grew up in the palace, cherished by no one and checked by no one. Who would dare stop a prince from stealing food from the grand tables and eating beneath them, devouring what he’d taken in savage bites? His sisters and brothers only laughed, playing with him as they would with a puppy.
He wore clothes only occasionally, donning garlands of flowers instead and throwing stones when the guard tried to come near him. None but his mother exerted any hold over him, and she seldom tried to curb his excesses. Just the opposite. “You’re a prince,” she told him firmly when he would shy away from a conflict or fail to make a demand. “Everything is yours. You have only to take it.” And sometimes: “I want that. Get it for me.”
It is said that faerie children are not like mortal children. They need little in the way of love. They need not be tucked in at night, but may sleep just as happily in a cold corner of a ballroom, curled up in a tablecloth. They need not be fed; they are just as happy lapping up dew and skimming bread and cream from the kitchens. They need not be comforted, since they seldom weep.
But if faerie children need little love, faerie princes require some counsel.
Without it, when Cardan’s elder brother suggested shooting a walnut off the head of a mortal, Cardan had not the wisdom to demur. His habits were impulsive; his manner, imperious.
“Keen marksmanship so impresses our father,” Prince Dain said with a small, teasing smile. “But perhaps it is too difficult. Better not to make the attempt than to fail.”
For Cardan, who could not attract his father’s good notice and desperately wanted it, the prospect was tempting. He didn’t ask himself who the mortal was or how he had come to be at the Court. Cardan certainly never suspected that the man was beloved of Val Moren and that the seneschal would go mad with grief if the man died.
Leaving Dain free to assume a more prominent position at the High King’s right hand.
“Too difficult? Better not to make the attempt? Those are the words of a coward,” Cardan said, full of childish bravado. In truth, his brother intimidated him, but that only made him more scornful.
Prince Dain smiled. “Let us exchange arrows at least. Then if you miss, you can say that it was my arrow that went awry.”
Prince Cardan ought to have been suspicious of this kindness, but he’d had little enough of the real thing to tell true from false.
Instead, he notched Dain’s arrow and pulled back the bowstring, aiming for the walnut. A sinking feeling came over him. He might not shoot true. He might hurt the man. But on the heels of that, angry glee sparked at the idea of doing something so horrifying that his father could no longer ignore him. If he could not get the High King’s attention for something good, then perhaps he could get it for something really, really bad.
Cardan’s hand wobbled.
The mortal’s liquid eyes watched him in frozen fear. Enchanted, of course. No one would stand like that willingly. That was what decided him.
Cardan forced a laugh as he relaxed the bowstring, letting the arrow fall out of the notch. “I simply will not shoot under these conditions,” he said, feeling ridiculous at having backed down. “The wind is coming from the north and mussing my hair. It’s getting all in my eyes.”
But Prince Dain raised his bow and loosed the arrow Cardan had exchanged with him. It struck the mortal through the throat. He dropped with almost no sound, eyes still open, now staring at nothing.
It happened so fast that Cardan didn’t cry out, didn’t react. He just stared at his brother, slow, terrible understanding crashing over him.
“Ah,” said Prince Dain with a satisfied smile. “A shame. It seems your arrow went awry. Perhaps you can complain to our father about that hair in your eyes.”
After, though he protested, no one would hear Prince Cardan’s side. Dain saw to that. He told the story of the youngest prince’s recklessness, his arrogance, his arrow. The High King would not even allow Cardan an audience.
Despite Val Moren’s pleas for execution, Cardan was punished for the mortal’s death in the way that princes are punished. The High King had Lady Asha locked away in the Tower of Forgetting in Cardan’s stead—something Eldred was relieved to have a reason to do, since he found her both tiresome and troublesome. Care of Prince Cardan was given over to Balekin, the eldest of the siblings, the cruelest, and the only one willing to take him.
And so was Prince Cardan’s reputation made. He had little to do but further it.
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Holly Black
Holly Black is the #1 New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of speculative and fantasy novels, short stories, and comics. She has been a finalist for an Eisner and a Lodestar Award, and the recipient of the Mythopoeic Award, a Nebula, and a Newbery Honor. She has sold over 26 million books worldwide, her work has been translated into over 30 languages and adapted for film. She currently lives in New England with her husband and son in a house with a secret library.
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Customer reviews
4.6 out of 5
43,345 global ratings
JP
5
Great Series
Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2024
Verified Purchase
These books are so beautifully written, you feel immersed in Fairyland. Loved Jude’s story, must reads for sure! I couldn’t put them down.
Tanner Carney
5
A true fan!
Reviewed in the United States on July 27, 2024
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Spoilers!
Wow. I mean just wow. I cannot believe how much I loved this book. What a redemption book! From the first book to this is just amazing. I really didn't enjoy book one. But now that I think about it maybe that was the point? To follow Judes transformation was just astonishing, from being a well behaved child that just wanted to be a knight to literally being the High Queen of Elfhame and loving it? The back and forth between her and Cardan was top tier. I've never hated someone the way that I hated him. Just to turn around and love him just as deeply. The scene when Jude had to kill him in serpent form was gut wrenching. I felt all the pain Jude did, and when he came back though the snakes dead body? My heart literally ached with relief. What an accomplishment this series was! Grade A character development, beautiful world building and a magic set up like no other. I also really enjoyed that although the fairie and other magical creatures were immortal, they were still very easily killed. Didn't require some crazy weapon or spell, just kill shots. And the blow that was dealt to Madoc!!! Couldn't have picked a better punishment! Bravo Holly Black! Turned me into a fan for sure!
Here's a couple quotes that melted my heart:
Jude: My sweet nemesis, how glad I am that you returned"
Cardan: “Mock me all you like. Whatever I imagined then, now it is I who would beg and grovel for a kind word from your lips.” His eyes are black with desire. “By you, I am forever undone.” 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
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Books and Cafes Blog
5
Fun and satisfying final installment with twists, romance, and female empowerment
Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2021
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Ah, this book is everything! The perfect conclusion to this spellbinding adventure (though thankfully, there are several novellas I can also dive into afterward). And can we take a moment to appreciate that cover—swoooon! All the covers in this series are gorgeous but this one is my personal favorite; each element ties into the most important aspects of the plot and the color scheme is icily delicious. I’m so, so glad I picked up this series and whole-heartedly recommend it to lovers of dark fairytales and fantasy.
We pick up with Jude, the Faerie Queen in exile, living in the mortal world with Vivi and Oak. Jude is miserable, doing odd jobs for other faeries in the neighborhood, until Taryn shows up asking Jude to take her place in the Elfhame court’s questioning of Locke’s murder. Why does she need Jude to pretend to be her? Oh, because Jude can honestly answer that she didn’t murder Locke, while Taryn cannot. Y’all! I have never liked Taryn more! In fact, I haven’t liked Taryn until this exact moment. Finally, she acknowledges Locke’s horrific treatment of her and his altogether unsuitability as anyone’s husband. Is murder an extreme reaction? Sure, but we know by now this is a dark fantasy and I fully support it. Sorry, not sorry.
And so our exiled heroine returns to Faerieland and the final adventure takes off. The plot of the third installment is riveting and unpredictable with all of the fast-paced twists and turns we’ve come to expect. While the entire series is a true-to-form fairytale, this book more-so than its predecessors incorporates the most quintessential fairytale elements: prophetic riddles, ancient artifacts, curses (so. many. curses), people turned into animals (though no true love’s kiss will turn them back), and of course, balls. You name it, this story has it. And none of it feels out of place—it all adds to the story and develops the most luscious, magical atmosphere.
The character development is once again the beating heart of the novel. After The Cruel Prince, I didn’t think it was possible for me to root as hard as I am for Jude and Cardan, yet all I want for them is a happy ending. Especially poor Cardan, who’s never really experienced love before. Any other Batman / Titans fans in the house? Cardan is really serving me Jason Todd vibes and I just want him to be okay.
Of course, Cardan isn’t the only important man in Jude’s life. Madoc continues to wreak havoc—I mean, this guy just won’t quit. And to a degree, I get it. He’s a centuries-old war General and his teenage daughter is showing him up at every turn. His pride is certainly on the line. But also, he’s a selfish, raging jerk. What was the point of him spending years raising Jude and Taryn in Faerie, educating them, acting like their dad, if he was going to drop all parental feelings the moment they used what he taught them? I can’t say much more without getting into spoilers, but I’m very satisfied with the way things are left with Madoc at the end.
Getting to see more of Heather and Vivi’s relationship is also fantastic. While they felt like side characters in the last book, their relationship is more front and center in this one and I finally understand why they want to be together. I also just love the bond between Jude and Heather as two mortals making their way through the perils of Faerie. On a similar note, it’s gratifying to see the three sisters finally come together and support one another. It demonstrates just how much each character has grown throughout the series.
Ugh, there’s just too much I love about this book to name it all, but as far as introducing new characters in the twelfth hour goes, Grima Mog is a badass boss! Goes to show Madoc’s not the only baddie in town. Honestly, all the women stand out in this novel—even Oriana and Nicasia have their moments. This couldn’t be a more rewarding conclusion. I’m looking forward to reading How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories next because as much as I love Jude, I’m dying for a little more Cardan backstory.
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2 people found this helpful
Alaina Hart
5
this series is everything to me
Reviewed in the United States on May 31, 2024
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I’m not even sure how to put into words the way this series has made me feel 🥺 first let me say I love it immensely and it’ll now reside in my top favorite fantasy series ever, rubbing elbow with Throne of Glass (which should really say enough if you know me at all)
This series, mainly this last book, made me feel a way I haven’t felt since I read Throne of Glass for the first time 2 years ago. And even more impressive is that Holly Black was able to evoke those same feelings from me in far less than half the amount of words. In 3 books and a super short novella, Holly had be as invested and in love with these characters and this story as SJM did in 8 huge books. The way Holly can tell a story so rich and beautiful in such a succinct amount of time is incredible and thrilling. I feel like I just read a high fantasy story of epic proportions and it only took 3 books that stayed around 300 pages in length.
This last book was really something else too. I enjoyed the entire series of course but this book had me on the edge of my seat biting my nails for the majority of it. A fantasy series hasn’t made my heart race like that in ages. The final battle scene had me feeling like Kingdom of Ash all over again. The chaos and surprise after surprise had my mind spinning and had me crying over and over again.
I know it may seem unfair to keep comparing this series to another, but Throne of Glass means everything to me so I just want to convey how phenomenal this series was to me and how it’s cemented itself in my heart.
The characters are arguably my favorite part of the whole thing. The growth we see in just three books from Cardan and Nicasia, even Vivi and Taryn, is so touching and surreal. Like looking back at book 1 Cardan and his friends I’d never have thought we’d end up here. Especially Nicasia, whose appearance made me sob hard in that final battle. The found family between Jude and the spies and Cardan, and then with Jude’s siblings just was really beautiful. Even the allies from other courts that don’t play a huge part in the grand scheme of things have a special place in my heart.
I’m so glad I finally picked up this series and I believe I’ll think of little else for some time.
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2 people found this helpful
Julia
5
Incredibly magical, heart-wrenching, and dangerous!
Reviewed in the United States on July 25, 2024
Verified Purchase
When my friend recommended this to me, I thought “ok, this is gonna be a bit cheesy and childish, isn’t it?” I couldn’t have been more wrong. I started the series and not even two chapters in I fell in love with it. Now, finishing my epic binge reading session, I am sad to part with Jude and Carden and the relationships the author has developed between the characters and I. Thank you, friend, for recommending this, and thank you, Holly Black, for bringing The Folk of the Air series into the world. I hope people enjoy this as much as I have.
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