The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

To purchase this novel with my Amazon link, click here ->https://amzn.to/46nivY0

Description:

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 hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.

Jude was seven years old when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.

To win a place at the Court, she must defy him--and face the consequences. In doing so, she becomes embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, discovering her own capacity for bloodshed. But as civil war threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.

Age Recommendation: 17+, 12th Grade- Young Adult

General Content:

Language: 2/10- A couple of cuss words sprinkled about, but not excessive.

Alcohol & Drugs: 7/10- Characters are often drinking, talking about drinking, or intoxicated.

Violence & Gore: 7/10- A considerable amount of violence, gore, and bullying.

Sexual Content: 5/10- Some discreet mentions of sex, a large amount of kissing, wandering hands, and revelry. Some instances of nudity.

Parent Guide:

Prologue:

-The family gets a knock on the door, and a man is out front. Upon seeing him, the mom’s face goes pale, and she orders her kids upstairs. The man, who we find out is named Madoc, states, “I doubted Balekin when he told me I’d find you here…The bones of an earthly woman and her unborn child in the burned remains of my estate were convincing. Do you know what it is to return from battle to find your wife dead, your only heir with her? To find your life reduced to ash.” The mom replies, “I was never going to be happy with you, your world isn’t for people like me”.

-The father swings an ax at Madoc, and he counters with a sword, killing him. The mom turns to run, and Madoc sticks her in the back. Both parents are dead. Madoc then looks to the oldest daughter (Vivienne) and tells her that she was stolen from him and will return with him to his homeland. Although only Vivi is his by blood, all 3 children go with him (Jude, Taryn, and Vivienne)

Ch. 2:

-“The servants are over fond of telling me how fortunate I am, a bastard daughter of a faithless wife, a human without a drop of faerie blood, to be treated like a trueborn child of Faerie”.

Ch. 3:

-Cardan, the 6th child of the king, and his posse bully Jude and another at the ball. Cardan’s group continues to bully others throughout the chapters, for example, kicking dirt in their food, making fun of the girls for being mortal (thus lacking beauty compared to the fae), etc.

Ch. 5:

-“‘Are you going to quit the tournament?’ Taryn asks, shoveling a handful of berries into her mouth. We are hungry children. Already we are taller than Vivi, our hips wider, and our breasts heavier”.

-“Vivi is in the photos, her arm draped over the shoulders of a grinning, pink-haired mortal girl. Maybe Taryn isn’t the only one who has decided to fall in love”.

Ch.6:

-Jude retells hard moments of living in Faerie, one of which is when one of Madoc's guards bites off the tip of Jude’s ring finger and tells her how much she hates mortals like her. She was 8 when this incident happened.

Ch.8:

-Vivi takes her sisters to the mortal world to meet her girlfriend, Heather. She tells her sisters that she and Heather want to move in together, and she wants them to come with her.

-Heather talks with Vivi’s sisters as she gets up to throw away trash. Heather asks about meeting their family and asks if Vivi’s dad knows she’s bisexual.

-“I wonder what she [Vivi] thinks as she moves among humans. At moments like that, she seems like a wolf learning the pattern of sheep. But when she kisses Heather, she is entirely genuine.

-“We start to cut across the parking lot… when a guy about our age touches my arm, warm fingers closing just above my wrist. ‘Hey sweetheart…I saw you before, and I was just wondering-‘ I am turning before I can think, my fist cracking into his jaw…I don’t remember deciding to hit him. I look over my shoulder. One of the boy's friends has given chase. ‘B***h!’ He shouts ‘Crazy b***h’”.

Ch.9:

-Cardan is taunting Jude by talking about her sister:

“‘I imagine that if I asked, she’d roll with me right here until we turned her white gown green and then thank me for the honor of my favor.’ He smiles…’Not that I’d be the first to green gown her.’”

Ch.11:

-Jude’s class is learning about reading prophecy in the stars. The class is unsatisfied, and a student makes a joke about wanting to learn about love instead:

“‘This is dull'…’If I am going to pass a night on my back, then I’d wish to be lessoned in love.’…’ Very well, ’ said Noggle. ‘Tell me what event might portend success in love?’’A girl taking off her dress,’ he says to more laughter".

-Jude recalls a memory where Cardan arrived at class drunk.

-Cardan and his friends bully Jude by forcing her to eat Faerie fruit, which “muddles the mind” and causes her to do practically anything they ask of her. One of the things they command of her is to take off her clothes in front of the whole class: “My gown slides into a puddle of cloth that I can easily step out of. I am wearing mortal underclothes- a mint-and-black polka-dotted bra and underpants”.

Ch. 12

-Jude pretends to be a human servant in Balekin’s palace and finds fey “intoxicated” on nevermore. They are said to be sleeping “in various states of undress, draped over couches and entwined on the floors of the parlors”.

-“I open another door to find several faeries twined together on a bed, asleep”.

-While spying, Jude witnesses swordplay between Cardan and his brother. Cardan loses and is punished with lashes to his bare back with a leather belt.

Ch. 14

-Locke visits Jude’s house to talk with her. He ends the conversation by attempting to kiss her, but failing when Jude is called from a distance.

“He brings one of my hands up to his mouth and presses his lips against my palm. My whole body tenses. I am suddenly too warm, too everything. His breath is a soft susurration against my skin. With a gentle tug, he pulls me closer. His arm is around me. He leans in for a kiss, and my thoughts slide away”.

Ch.16

-Locke continued flirting with Jude, he “occasionally walks her home through the woods, stopping to kiss her near a corpse of fir trees just before her estate”.

-Cardan's friend tries to get Jude to admit defeat and then jump from the tower to her death. When she doesn’t listen, he pushes her against a wall and begins choking her, she stabs him to get away.

-Locke explains to Jude that his mom was killed by poison for having an illegitimate child with the king.

-Locke and Jude are alone at his home, they kiss multiple times, out on the balcony and down the stairs, hands wandering. Nothing past wandering hands happens.

“I want his mouth on mine, blotting out everything else. It takes us a long time to wend our way back down the stairs. My hands are in his hair. His mouth is on my neck. My back is against the ancient stone wall…I am not sure where to put my hands, how hard to grab, how deep to sink my nails into his shoulders. And while I know what comes after kissing, while I know what it means to have his hands slide over my bruised calf to my thigh, I have no idea how to hide my inexperience”.

-Locke talks Jude into staying at his party so he can witness Cardan and his friends outside of school, “come see them be foolish, drunk, and debased”.

-Cardan arrives at the party drunk, and Jude sees him lying on the grass being kissed by 2 girls.

“Cardan is lying on a blanket, his head tipped back and his loose white shirt unbuttoned. Although it is still early in the night, he appears to be very drunk. His mouth is flaked with gold. A horned girl I don’t know is kissing his throat, and another, this one with daffodil hair, presses her mouth against the calf of his leg…He watches me as the girl kisses his mouth, watches me as she slides her hand beneath the hem of his silly, ruffly shirt”.

-“The piper finishes, and a naked boy, shining with gold paint, takes out a lyre and sings a filthy song about broken hearts.”

Ch.17

-Jude wakes up the next day in Locke's bed, they are both fully clothed.

-The human servants in Balekin's estate are mistreated, being charmed to continue to work without stopping.

-The human servant that Jude saves commits suicide by throwing herself off of Vivi’s flying animal, plummeting into the water.

Ch.18

-As punishment for stabbing Valerian, Prince Dain makes Jude stab herself in the hand.

-Vivi tells Jude that as she lay in bed with her girlfriend, Heather, that she had traced her ears (Vivi is half human and has slightly pointed ears), she comments saying that Vivi had “good ear modding”.

-Madoc's wife, Orianna, tells Jude that she was once one of the king's consorts: “It is no easy thing to be the lover of the high king”.

-Valerian shows up on Jude's balcony, drunk, with a knife, trying to get back at her for stabbing him. He tries to stab her multiple times, but she ends up stabbing him in the chest, killing him. She hides his body under the bed.

Ch.20

-As the king resigns, Val Moren, the court poet and seneschal, is introduced. He is said to have been “lured away from the mortal lands to Eldred’s (The king) bed in his youth”.

-During the ceremony, Prince Dain is handed the crown to become the next king. The ceremony includes a part where Dain's mother removes his large white covering, under which is nothing, leaving him naked as the ceremony continues.

-Balekin, the king's firstborn, is unsatisfied with not being the next king; in response, he ends up killing most of his family. By the end of the chapter, the king and 4 of his 6 children get murdered by Balekin and others on his side.

Ch. 22

-Cardan tells Jude and Dain's other spies that Dain had fathered a child with his father’s consort, out of fear, he had the consort and her fetus poisoned and killed.

Ch. 25

-Jude kisses Cardan.

Ch. 26

-Jude describes her kiss with Cardan. “He kisses me hard, with a kind of devouring desperation, finger digging into my hair. Our mouths slid together, teeth over lips over tongues. Desire hits me like a kick to the stomach”.