Reviewed by Carissa
TITLE: Betrothed: A Faery Tale
AUTHOR: Therese Woodson
PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press
LENGTH: 200 pages
BLURB:
Faery royalty have always married for duty rather than love. Prince Chrysanths should be no different—except with a human for a father, the prince known as Puck already is different. When he is betrothed against his will to Prince Sky, Puck flees to his father in the human world, only to have Sky follow.
Prince Sky Song of the Clouds isn’t thrilled with the prospect of marriage either, but is bound by duty to follow through. If he can’t win Puck over, the faery realm might very well dissolve into utter chaos. Too busy arguing, Puck and Sky are unaware there are others with a vested interest in seeing the betrothal fail. In a bid for Puck’s crown, they’ll seek to keep them apart, even as Puck and Sky realize that duty and love don’t always have to be mutually exclusive.
REVIEW:
So…I don’t like Fae, fairies, or fairy dust. Which may be a bit odd since this is the second book I’ve read this week that had them in them. And I have loved both of them. So there’s me being schooled. But even if the character origins are something I usually go three miles out of my way to avoid, I have loved the other stories by this author, so I really wanted to read this novel.
Also, the cover is so pretty. I’m a sucker for a pretty cover.
So even though I don’t like Fae-stories, I really liked this one. Therese Woodson actually created a world that feels worth reading, and knowing more about. And even if one of her characters is named Puck, she avoided the whole Shakespeare-fairy-cliche thing that drives me batty. It is mostly just a pet peeve–and not one that makes much sense–but I hate Shakespeare fairies. I was a bit worried when I saw one of the character was named Puck, but since it is more a nickname than a recreation of an overplayed character, I didn’t mind all that much.
And this seems like an awful lot of complaining at the front end of this review. Especially for a book I don’t have many complaints about. I guess I just wanted people to understand why I liked this so much. Woodson made me like fairies. That is a big thing for me.
Therese Woodson did a great job of making a world that fit her characters, and characters that fit her world. The whole four-elements thing is hardly new, but it works. Maybe because the characters seemed more than your average fairy princes. Maybe it was just well constructed–enough that you get a sense of the place, but not so much that it feels like you are getting every minute detail thrown at you.
Puck is…well, he is a bit of an asshole during the first half of this book. Ok, it is probably more towards self-centered jerk territory than actual assholeness, but the dude–for all that I like him–really needed that reality check by his dad. But despite the fact I’m surprised Sky didn’t just slap the dude, I think the struggles they had to get thru together made the romance all the better.
My only issue with this story is that the whole fire-fairy thing seemed to go nowhere. It sorta flashed up a bit and then burnt out in rather a short time period. I don’t know if there is a second book planned where it will be explored in more depth, but here it seemed to fizzle out way too soon.
Despite that, and my almost instinctual avoidance of fairy-tales, I really enjoyed this story. Add to that a cover that well worth the price of admission, and you have a winning mix. So if you are looking for a light-hearted forced-marriage story I totally recommend this one. I don’t think you will be disappointed.
RATING:
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