After loving the Cruel Prince series my partner bought me the Modern Faerie tales in an effort to bridge the torturous gab between The Wicked King and The Queen of Nothing. I read Tithe last year during that period and I remember enjoying it and being excited when Kaye and Roiben were mentioned in The Cruel Prince series. I didn’t like it enough to go straight on to Valiant though.
Finally, after a serious look at my shelves and realising I have sooooo many unfinished series, I decided to pick it up. These books are seriously short, even if I have them in a menacing omnibus, so good way for me to cross books off.
So, a brief plot summary. After some seriously screwed up things happen Val runs away to New York. There she becomes friends with Lolli, Dave, and Luis, and they introduce her to the world of faerie, for whom they are couriers. The potion they deliver also gives them a high like they’re a faerie. Val quickly becomes indebted to the creator of the potions, a troll called Ravus.
I’m not really sure what to say about it. These books were written in the early noughties and they feel very, very different to anything you would read in YA now. They’re dark and this book is especially so, dealing with things like addiction.
I kind of liked it. I mean I was pretty indifferent for the first half, but the last hundred pages really were good. I like the gritty aspect of it as I think it’s very different in a YA book. I wouldn’t want to read it all the time though.
I definitely didn’t enjoy this book as much as Tithe. I think I would have preferred more time spent developing Val and Ravus’ relationship as that was one of the things I really liked. It also had the death of a cat in which I am seriously not cool with, although I kind of felt like that would happen when it was introduced so I tried not to get too attached.
I’m interested enough to see what happens in Ironside, especially as that returns more to Kaye I think. These books are definitely no where near as good as The Cruel Prince though. I give it a 3.5*
The London Faerie 