In a moment of intuition, Ellina decides to give Venick a chance: learn elvish, reveal his truths, and she will set him free.Īs Ellina and Venick grow to know one another, their feelings start to shift. Desperate, he lies about his identity in hopes the elves will spare his life.Įllina doesn’t trust the human, and not merely because he speaks the language of men.

When Venick is caught wandering the elflands, he knows the penalty is death. It’s against the law for elves and humans to fall in love. As a result, they thought the romance was unconvincing. Related to this, critics couldn’t see what about the characters found attractive about each other. Generally, these readers also found them unsympathetic: they tended to describe Jude as embittered and passive while Cardas came across as a bully.

In terms of the former, several described Jude and Cardan as familiar Young Adult Fantasy types. For instance, Jude came across to them as a standard ‘strong female character’ while Cardas seemed like a standard ‘bad boy with a tragic past’. What did critics say about The Cruel Prince? For the most part, these readers cited either the characters and their romance as reasons for not enjoying the book. To these readers, she was a refreshing anti-hero, both complex and relatable. In addition, Jude won them over with her mix of fierceness, determination and cunning. Readers described themselves as transported both into the story’s pages because of their unique portrayal as well as their enchanting world. What Do Readers Say?įirst on our list of enemies to lovers fantasy books is The Cruel Prince. This novel captured fans’ imaginations with its suspense, intriguing portrayal of faeries and its strong-willed protagonist, Jude.ĭangerous yet darkly alluring, the faeries came across as all-together magical. 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. In doing so, she becomes embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, discovering her own capacity for bloodshed. To win a place at the Court, she must defy him – and face the consequences. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. 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. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe. And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest.

Enemies to lovers books fantasy