Review: Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale – Holly Black

Modern Faerie Tales #1

SYNOPSIS: Sixteen-year-old Kaye is a modern nomad. Fierce and independent, she travels from city to city with her mother’s rock band until an ominous attack forces Kaye back to her childhood home. There, amid the industrial, blue-collar New Jersey backdrop, Kaye soon finds herself an unwilling pawn in an ancient power struggle between two rival faerie kingdoms – a struggle that could very well mean her death. – via Goodreads

You know, I was such a big fan of The Cruel Prince and The Wicked King that I was quite looking forward to checking out other books from Holly Black, but I have to say that I was extremely underwhelmed by this book. Honestly, if I did not know that they were written by the same person, I would never have guessed it. The writing style is worlds apart!

Tithe is quite crazy – and not necessarily in a good way. The writing is super stinted, and also the flow of the book is all over the show. There is virtually no logic to it, and it is so weird. There are absolutely no likeable characters here. They’re all just… not nice, and really nasty and cruel and it just isn’t any good (for me). This book also seems to be geared at YA readers, which is a little wild because I do feel that the content is quite a bit more mature. I mean, the lead character is supposed to be around 15/16, and is dealing with a seriously neglectful mother, smokes heavily, drinks a lot, is essentially homeless, lives quite trashy, and sex is only thinly veiled in this. Which is not to say all a bad thing, but the roughness makes this a bit much for me to see as YA o.O Maybe I am just a prude, whatever.

There is also the romance between Kaye and Roiben. I want to say I like it, as it is the best thing about this book, but that isn’t saying much, because even the romance is meh. She vacillates between hating him (for what, I don’t even know), to desperately pining for him (again, wtf). There isn’t even real conflict between them. It feels like it was shoehorned in. Anyway, I thought this was super messy. There was a story told with no rhyme or reason, so you can’t even give a crap. There are no characters to like and root for, and the writing is all over the show. I don’t think I will be rushing for a reread for this, and will stick to The Folk of the Air books.