Book Review: Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air #3) by Holly Black

Synopsis:

He will be the destruction of the crown and the ruination of the throne.
Power is much easier to acquire than it is to hold on to. Jude learned that lesson when she released her control over the wicked king, Cardan, in exchange for immeasurable power.
Now, as the exiled mortal Queen of Faerie, Jude is left reeling from Cardan's betrayal. She bides her time, determined to reclaim everything he took from her. Opportunity arrives in the form of her deceptive twin sister, Taryn, whose mortal life is in peril.
Jude must risk venturing back into the treacherous Faerie Court, and confront her lingering feelings for Cardan, if she wishes to save her sister. But Elfhame is not as she left it. War is brewing. As Jude slips deep within enemy lines, she becomes ensnared in the conflict's bloody politics.
And when a terrible curse is unleashed, panic spreads throughout the land, forcing her to choose between her ambition and her humanity....
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Holly Black comes the highly anticipated and jaw-dropping finale to the Folk of the Air series.

If you’ve been following my posts for the past month or so, you’ll know that I said this series was one of my favorites from the past year. This third book was everything I wanted it to be.

After Cardan exiles Jude at the end of the second book, Jude is fuming in the human world. I honestly couldn’t believe she didn’t know what was happening. Cardan is so much softer than she thinks for most of this series. But of course, that is part of what makes their relationship interesting, the fact that it takes so much for them to finally trust each other.

To be fair, almost no one in faerie trusts each other ever, so should we really be surprised?

I think one of the things that I liked the most about this book was that Jude realized she’d been an idiot for a while. Trying to control everything and everyone with no trust and no real relationship just wasn’t going to work with how little power she actually possessed. I loved how all the relationships progressed in this book. Not just with Jude and Cardan (although that was delicious), but with Jude and her sisters, some resolution with her step-father, and many others.

Lest you fear this is all sunshine and daisies, it is most certainly not. Jude has to figure out how to avert a war that is bubbling against Cardan and Elfhame. She has to make a bargain with a particularly nasty red-cap (wasn’t that a fun scene at the beginning!). There’s betrayal, surprise allies, curses to be broken, mysteries to be solved…it’s all here.

But I think my favorite part of the book was definitely Cardan and Jude’s development. They’d been fighting each other for so long, it was such a relief for them to finally communicate and get on the same page. Among other things.

The Folk of the Air has definitely found a place on my favorites list, and I’m already thinking about when I can re-read it!