The Cruel Prince (The Folk of the Air) – Book Review

I was compelled to read the book since it got so many reviews on Amazon, and it was free in Kindle Unlimited subscription. It started with murders, where a fairy came into the house and killed the Jude’s parents, right in front of her and her sisters. So far so good, I thought.

It then followed her life where she was taken in by the murderer, who happens to be her step-father, back to fairyland and raised with her sisters as his own. Then the story tells about her hardships and mishaps, including her love story, or lack of it. Among them is the antagonist, the elf Prince Cardan who enjoys torturing her. She then got involved with the intrigue of the castle and played a crucial part in turning the kingdom upside down. Gets even better.

This book is part of a trilogy. There is also another parallel book that tell the story from the point of the antagonist, Cardan, and how his life is full of torture and kinda justifies why he’s a jerk on everyone else, including Jude. In this parallel book also it summarises “spoiler alert” that in the end, the jerk becomes a hero and the heroine falls in love with him. I read this parallel book first, so I always knew at the end that these two characters are going to be with each other, but it surprised me that even by the end of book 1, they still have quite a long way to go. In short, I am pleased that the characters don’t simply do a 180 and becomes good friends.

Character growth wise however, I think the main character doesn’t really progress so far. She didn’t stagnant but I was expecting more confidence in her since she is described, or implied by other character, that she is strong. It might however be though that since the story is told from a person view, it shows the readers all her thoughts bare none. Another thing I don’t like is that some back stories or information are told off-handedly or simply shoved into the reader’s face. I’m old so sometimes I prefer subtlety to stark proses.

The language are quite interesting and have a lot of unfamiliar, archaic or dialect words. They however lend a mood to the story and I quite like it. It is also quite amazing that the writer manages to find a lot of names for magical creatures, which are not made up, in the sense there are existing folklores about them. I realized this when I pressed the words on Kindle and they jumped straight to Wikipedia articles on these creatures.

All in all a recommended read for fantasy fan who used to read on Harry Potter. The character is a bit juvenile but it has some of the intrigues of politics and riddles.