Cruel Crown is a collection of two prequels - Queen Song and Steel Scars - to the first in the Red Queen series, The Red Queen.
Queen Song is one of the novellas. Here, we are told about the backstory of Queen Coriane, the mother of Prince Cal from Red Queen. Coriane belongs to the Silver blood, under the House Jacos - a not-so-well-endowed clan compared to other Silver bloods. She writes her life events in a diary and conveys her emotions there. Her ordinary life changed when Prince Tibe, heir to the Court of Norta, fell in love with her and asked for her hand in marriage, which of course became the reason why the traditional Queenstrial was never realised. This led to conflicts and certain intrigues that tested Coriane’s strength and belief while carrying her crown as a Queen.
It’s Victoria Aveyard’s flawless and breathtaking writing style that made me embrace this novella. Once again I was amazed by how she was able to bring this story to an epic level. There were no action scenes here but all the events were simply engaging. I loved how the simple plot surprisingly became extraordinarily beautiful in the end.
The romance between Coriane and Tibe was sweet and raw, even heartbreaking at times. There was also a good pacing here and the Silver blood’s powers were drawn neatly.
Perhaps Coriane’s character development was the one that’s lacking here. She came out fragile and weak at the beginning but she was starting to get tough near the end. Unfortunately, she went back to being weak again at the very end, surrendering to her fate and accepting her vulnerability, that she couldn’t do anything to save herself and the people she cared about.
All in all, this novella is totally compelling despite some minor flaws. It’s nice to know Coriane’s story after she was mysteriously mentioned in Red Queen. It is written in a poignant yet beautiful prose, something that holds your attention throughout. When it comes to the ending, it was a bit hazy and mind-boggling, thus leaving us with a big question: WHO DID IT?
I thought by reading Steel Scars, the second novella in Cruel Crown, I would be in for a badass story. Not really. It was just…boring. Farley’s character is mostly dull and not enjoyable to read about. There wasn’t any real action as you would have expected from the leader of a rebellion, which was confusing.
Although one of the only things that made this novella quite interesting is Shade Barrow, everything else seemed slightly disappointing. Perhaps that is to be expected after the great expectations set by Red Queen (and when I say ‘great’ I mean the Burj Khalifa of books).
I did however find the grit of Farley’s area very intriguing in contrast to the usual places we have read about in the rest of the series. Although the second novella didn’t live up to the first, the entire rest of the Red Queen Trilogy is absolutely breathtaking and I highly recommend it.
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