Whom I really came to love though are the Roach and the Bomb. I thought at first that they were okay, but after this, OMG, I love them. Especially the Bomb. Like, she’s really cool and knows how to play everything off. And also SHE’S A MASTER OF EXPLOSIVES so she has a popping personality indeed. Her mom would constantly tell her stories about ghosts and would play games involving scavenger hunts. Many of her books revolve around fairies, and they draw inspiration from folk tales, mythology, and the art of fairies. Because you’re like a story that hasn’t happened yet. Because I want to see what you will do. I want to be part of the unfolding of the tale.” However, The Darkest Part of the Forest was written as a standalone novel and can still be read as such. Whilst it is set within the same world as The Cruel Prince it follows different characters and a different storyline. the romance. i swear i'm sounding like a broken record to even my own ears, but WHAT ROMANCE?! this is not what i was promised. it's so random. every single time something happened i'd go, "oh, that came out of NOWHERE." why? because they have no chemistry. didn't feel it in the first book, didn't feel it here.

The book is a collection of short stories organized into nine chapters, which are richly illustrated. The chapters include stories from Cardan's early childhood, occurring before the main trilogy; stories occurring within the timespan of the trilogy, told from Cardan's point of view; and stories occurring after the events of The Queen of Nothing. If you put me in a library and tell me said library is closing in 45 minutes and also that after that it will be closed for at least two weeks (but really for the foreseeable future), things happen. The Folk of Air series is a fun read in 3 parts. Plots with surprises; detailed worldbuilding; characters that grow in satisfying ways. But Taryn really is trying to carve out her own place in a world that she never asked to live in. Vivi, Jude, and Taryn didn’t ask to lose their mother, be ripped from their home, and forced to live among people who will never make them feel like they belong. But all three girls feel and handle things very differently. Vivi feels sadness and wishes to escape. Jude feels angry and wishes for revenge. Taryn feels inadequacy and wishes for love. And all of these things are valid, and none of things are lesser, they are just different. Rhiya Greenbriar; Daughter of Eldred; Sister to Balekin, Dain, Elowyn, Caelia and half-sister to Cardan; Good friend of Vivi; Killed herselfTwo sisters, raised in a land of beautiful nightmares. Both terrified. Both hungering for a place to belong, to be important. Both selfish, lying snakes. And my not-dear Taryn, that will not change however much you chant to all who would listen that you are loyal and giving. Once upon a time, there was a human girl stolen away by faeries, and because of that, she swore to destroy them.” As the action goes on, I just can’t help but fall in love with him with every chapter. He’s just…such an amazing character that sometimes I feel like he’s the only one who’s been blessed with character depth (even though the characters' own emotional profiles seem to deepen in this book more than in the first one). Cardan just gets better and better and he surprised me with his cunning and wisdom more than once. one other thing is that the matter of their appearances, which wasn't mentioned much or a huge part of the story in the first two books, became a little too unavoidable in the last book. it weirded me out so bad and caused me to kind of tap out from, and no longer connect to, the story at times.

This novella, which was kind of a letter written from Taryn to Jude, only reinforced the conviction I’ve settled into after reading The Cruel prince:Jude visits Grimsen to buy a gift for Taryn's wedding. Grimsen tells her he knows of her mortal father's metalworking and suggests that he once taught him. He offers Jude a pair of earrings to give Taryn in exchange for one of Jude's tears. The earrings are enchanted to magnify the wearer's beauty. Grimsen asks Jude to take a message to the king: if they go to war, he will fashion armor that cannot be penetrated and swords so strong Cardan will easily win. And that, all of that, weaves itself through every nook, around every thread of the books. It hugs Jude’s curves and flies from her lips, slides along Cardan’s tail and between his clever clasp. It wraps its hungry grasp around the characters, bathing, entombing, suffocating. And it, quite gloriously, circles the dynamics and bonds, twisting and blurring the lines of love and hate, want and fear, until it is one with its every angle, dip, and chip. I guess it makes sense some would mistake one for the other. On the day of the banquet, Jude and Madoc duel over the crown. Jude manages to win by poisoning Madoc’s wine, after which however, Jude had Oak crown Cardan so that he can be her puppet and she can rule through him. Jude Duarte: High Queen of Elfhame; Eva and Justin's daughter; Taryn's twin sister; Vivi's half-sister; Madoc's foster daughter; Oak's adopted sister; Cardan's wife

me, deep in an elaborate fantasy sequence in which Jude forces me onto a throne for her own selfish gain and is an ambitious bitch to me and treats me terribly but also we have a lot of sexual tension: uhhhhh well I just really like the plot twists Probablemente es el mejor “enemies to lovers” que he leído porque literalmente es eso, al principio se odian, y mucho. But I genuinely can’t tell you if his manipulations of Taryn are so deep she can’t even notice it lining her every seam, or if he glimpsed the fleeting slices and the jagged pieces—glittering and sharp and hungry—obfuscated beneath Taryn’s exterior and saw something he recognized.And with that power comes a safety Jude has never known. And she learns that she likes it. She craves it. And she will do anything in her power to keep her position. “I’ve wanted this and feared it, and now that it’s happening, I don’t know how I will ever want anything else.” But, her once simple plan seems to be fraying. Jude and Cardan meet with Nicasia. Cardan tells Nicasia to tell her mother that the next time she threatens him, her daughter will become his prisoner. He asks her whether she would want to be bound to him forever in an unhappy union, and Nicasia says there is more to ruling than happiness, and she thinks her mother's idea is a good one. This was beautifully written, as always, and I loved the other fairytales within this one. The world that Holly has crafted in this series is as beautiful as it is terrifying - I love it so much. It was interesting being in Taryn’s head, seeing her try and justify herself to Jude, and it was really fun to see interactions between Jude and the Folk (especially Jude and Cardan). *sigh* Content and trigger warnings for murder, death, bullying, abandonment, captivity, abuse, talk of past child abuse, and for violence in general. Vivi seemed totally great in the first book. I actually came to love her. But in this one, she’s definitely changed. Some of her certain actions do not represent her as they should and so, she’s no less amongst my own personal list of favourites of the book.