The Cruel Prince
- 385
- Pages
- about 7 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“The Cruel Prince” is at its best as a story of court intrigue: a mortal girl with more ambition than power, scheming her way through a treacherous faerie court. Jude is the reason to read it, sharp and not always likeable, and the last hundred pages gather real suspense. It reads quickly and easily. Some readers see the big twist coming, and the romance grows out of open hostility, which will not suit everyone.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Holly Black, comes the first book in a stunning new series about a mortal girl who finds herself caught in a web of royal faerie intrigue. 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.
Reading order · The Folk of the Air
Full order & progress →- The Cruel PrinceThis book
7.87.8 / 10 - The Wicked King
8.38.3 / 10 - The Queen of Nothing
8.38.3 / 10
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.8 across 1,886 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 93% of the weight and the score stays at 7.8 — the Young adult average of 7.8 barely moves it.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.0 | 164 | 9% |
| Hardcover | 7.7 | 1.7K | 91% |
Frequently asked
What age is The Cruel Prince for?
The Cruel Prince sits on the Young adult shelf in the sources we use, which by convention means roughly ages 13 and up. This is a guide from the book’s category, not a publisher’s age rating. It has 385 pages — shorter than 80% of the ranked books in Young adult.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
The same shelf — Young adult — and a score of 7.8, the closest to this book.
