Book Review: The Wicked King

The Wicked King by Holly Black

♥♥♥♥♥

Title: The Wicked King
Author: Holly Black
Year Published: 2019
Publisher: Little, Brown Books
Genre: Young Adult, Fiction, Fantasy

Plot: ♥♥♥♥♥
Characters: ♥♥♥♥♥
World Building: ♥♥♥♥♥
Flow: ♥♥♥♥♥

Synopsis:

You must be strong enough to strike and strike and strike again without tiring.

The first lesson is to make yourself strong.

After the jaw-dropping revelation that Oak is the heir to Faerie, Jude must keep her younger brother safe. To do so, she has bound the wicked king, Cardan, to her, and made herself the power behind the throne. Navigating the constantly shifting political alliances of Faerie would be difficult enough if Cardan were easy to control. But he does everything in his power to humiliate and undermine her even as his fascination with her remains undiminished.

When it becomes all too clear that someone close to Jude means to betray her, threatening her own life and the lives of everyone she loves, Jude must uncover the traitor and fight her own complicated feelings for Cardan to maintain control as a mortal in a Faerie world.

Review*:

  This is the first book in a long time that I've felt a hang-over after reading and found myself wanting to spend more time with the characters. Which is unfortunate because the third book doesn't come out until sometime in 2020. In my opinion, this book was far better than The Cruel Prince even though I did enjoy that book as well.
  We fall right back into Jude and web of power she has woven for herself. The very beginning of the book, we get a quote from Madoc that certainly fits the theme of the remainder of the story, which is those that gaining power is far easier than keeping power. Pairing that with the fact that Jude has managed to piss off quite a bit of Faerie, the beginning of this book is full of opportunity and suspense.
   Cardan is as aloof as ever, not taking his responsibility as King very seriously and essentially allowing Jude to run the throne through the power she has over him. He is by far my favorite dark and broody character I've read. He starts off as this hateful bully to Jude but then he transforms into this slightly love-able but 100% morally ambiguous character who has a weird way of expressing his interest in women he actually cares about. In The Wicked King he's still playing a bad boy, but we get to know a little bit more about him and despite the trickery he pulled on Jude, I find myself trusting him to do the right thing in the long run.
   I was slightly disappointed in the pace of intimacy between him and Jude, I would have loved a tease rather than a full on sex in the closet scene. That being said, there was a lot of tension that was built up in their relationship prior and post their scandalous romping session. Instead of having their first time having sex be the romance build up, between Cardan and Jude it's more of a tension and build up to have them finally admit that they love/want each other. 
  Jude has been an amazing main character and to see this whole story through her POV has been awesome. She doubts herself, she pushes herself, she doesn't dwell on much. We see her be cunning and murderous, and I love that she doesn't destroy herself internally for being a badass. Jude also has all these cards she stacks in her favor and when the tower comes down, it's the little things that work in her favor. 
   Madoc has been a roler coaster, and the fact that he tricked Cardan out of half of his military and left him with no general makes me so excited to see where it leads us in the next book. I think he and maybe the Court of Termites will be our enemy for the third book since a truce was called between the land and the sea, which was an epic display of power on Cardan's part. Or, maybe Orlagh and the sea find a way to become enemies again as I'm sure agreeing to another peace when Orlagh was so close to having total domination. 
  The pacing in this book was a lot better than The Cruel Prince. For me, the first half of the first book was super slow and it felt like all of the action happened at the end that really drew you into the characters and plot. I'm not sure if it's because it was the second book or if it was because there was a lot to cram into these chapters but everything had a really great flow.
   Don't sleep on this series, however if you don't want to wait the long gap between now and the next release I totally understand. However don't be sour if all I do is talk about this book on Twitter. You can mute me now.

*There may be spoilers in this section of the review. If you do not wish to be spoiled, please stop reading.