The Captive Prince Series - C.S. Pacat (01/01/20)

This review will pretty much encompass all three books in this series; however it will contain no plot spoilers. It seems to be based in some kinds of ‘Roman’ based fantasy realm. The story itself is based surrounding a Prince called Damon and his journey to escape his enslavement to the Crown Prince of a rival nation, named Laurent. The books contain very strong themes and imagery throughout which may be a trigger for some people. This may not be a book for everyone. It is almost solely M/M for its ‘romantic’ scenes.

I overall found the book to be very enjoyable and quickly became invested in the characters. The book overall seems very character driven, which is why I think the pace was fast for the most part. I managed to read all three of these books in weekend (including a 30-page novella as I just had to have more). I particularly enjoyed the character development in the series. In the first book you become invested in Damon and how he just wants to get home. He is still grieving the loss of his father and the betrayal of those closest to him, which is how he has ended up as a pleasure slave. The second book looks at the changing dynamic between the two princes and the third pulls everything to a dramatic close. I love the conflicted emotions of the Princes. Damon goes from having an opinion of the Crown prince like this;

“A golden prince was easy to love if you did not have to watch him picking wings off flies”

 

Honestly, I did not see how a romantic relationship would form as the initial interactions between Damon and Laurent are awful. As you would expect an entitled prince to treat a pleasure slave. But some scenes are brutal and you wonder how they will see past them. But by the time you get to the second book, something has shifted. Some small glimpse of Laurent’s true character have been seen by Damon.

“Damon said, with helpless honesty, “ Laurent, I am your slave.””

And one of my favorite quotes is the following,

“A kingdom, or this.”

By the third book there is so much tension and angst between them I devoured the book in now time what so ever. I just needed to know how this would end for them both…

“I think if I gave you my heart, you would treat it tenderly.”

“Don’t, toy with me. I – have not the means to – defend myself against this.”

I would recommend this book if you want to read a vivid M/M book with strong character building. Overall I gave the first book a 3* rating and the 2^nd, 3^rd book and novella all received a solid 4* rating. There were some areas that I feel could have been looked into more deeply, however it did not detract from the overall story.

August Fairyloot 2019

 

So first things first. I am not being paid for this. My husband bought me a subscription to Fairyloot for my 30th Birthday (this July).  The August box is the first box I have ever received. And it did not disappoint. I cant even begin to explain how much I enjoyed opening this box and how good the quality is of all the items. So lets break down this unboxing.

 I will add, I had to open this in my kitchen, because my 3 year old would have been all over it, and I literally couldn't wait until he was in bed as I had been waiting since July to get a box!

I have seen enough unboxings on YouTube to know the card on top is the spoiler card, so I put that to one side straight away. At this point I just want to say I couldn't believe how beautiful the box was on the inside. I am not going to be precious about keeping the box, but it wasn't lost on me how lovely it looked when I opened it. Underneath the spoiler card was some lovely purple packing,it looked high quality and well packed when I opened this box. Now onto the stuff...

The first thing I pulled out was this set of 3x scrunchies. Honestly not my favorite item in the box, and I didn't initially recognise the fandom. When I checked the spoiler card and saw it was for the Graceling trilogy, I must admit I liked them a little bit more, however I have only read the first book in the series and that was quite a few years ago. Once I knew it was easy to see the references to each of the books; Green for Graceling, Red for Fire and Blue for Bitterblue. It is really unlikely I would wear these out, but I do put my hair up for bed so I have designated these for bedtime scrunchies.

The next item i pulled out was a Candle from 'Flick the Wick', again I didn't recognise the fandom as 'Slaking Jack the Ripper' is actually on my Kindle to read, I in fact bought it a couple of weeks ago with my birthday voucher. So the smell is a coffee and chocolate scent for the character Thomas Cresswell. All I can say is the scent is heavenly! I hope I like this series just based on this scent alone. It primarily smells chocolate, but more on the Shea/coco butter type of smell. Which happens to be one of my favorite scents. I literally made an audible moan when I opened this to smell. I haven't tried burning this yet but I really hope it emits a good amount of smell.

The next item is a Lord of the Rings themed mirror. Not much to say about this item, its a nice enough, simple small mirror. Again like with the scrunchies I'm probably not going to use it as if it was a bag mirror I would have liked a flip open back, otherwise its just going to get scratched it. I a a Tolkien fan, but my husband is more of a Tolkien fan than me, and he has in fact claimed this item for his man cave. This item along with the scrunchies were my least liked items, but that doesn't mean i disliked them. I liked them but compared to everything else they were the least impressive items.

This item was my first little 'squeee' moment. I was slightly confused pulling out this little pink box initially then I saw on the back it said cutlery set. I opened it and found a lovely little pink velvet bag. when I opened this I nearly died with happiness. In side was a set of chopsticks, a fork and a spoon. All rainbow coloured! I loved them straight away, then I noticed it had some engraving on it. When I read the engraving I knew straight away what fandom it was from. The Lunar Chronicles. I have read all but the last book in this series and loved them all. I will be using these for work.

 Then I pulled out this beautiful, very good quality, cushion cover. It is listed as a pillow case, but as far as I am concerned pillowcases are rectangles, not squares. Either way, its a lovely item, and another one I recognised, the cushions read, "You will burn for you are an ember in the ashes". I am actually currently reading 'An Ember in the Ashes', loving it by the way. So whilst I am not currently part of the fandom, I feel like I will be soon. I did wonder how good the quality of items like this would be, as I have recently bought a 'Court of Thorns and Roses' cushion cover from 'Wish' for a couple of £'s and I wondered if this was where these companies got cushions covers as well.... I can confidently say they do not. This is a lovely item I will be using when I get a cushion filler. 

This may be one of my favourite items in the whole box. It is a laser cut metal book mark complete with a Brandon Sanderson quote. It is a beautiful rose gold colour with a shiny grey tassel. Honestly I love this book mark, I feel awful saying I haven't yet read any Brandon Sanderson novels, but again the Mistborn saga that this bookmark showcases is on my to read list. It is incredible quality, it has some really delicate sections but these are sturdy and none of it feels like it is going to break.

  

This box just keeps giving! These are the next two cards in the new tarot card set. These appear to be Harry and Hermione. Obviously I am Ravenclaw, I'm completely into Harry Potter. It was the original series that got me into reading, got me excited about a book release. I'm into it! As this is my first box I have actually missed 4 cards so far 2x sets of 2 cards. I am hoping to buy these separately as I would love this to be a full collected set. The artwork is beautiful, the quality is lovely and has a matt type finished which is much nicer then if it was a shiny finish. They are just really lovely.

Lastly, the book. The real reason everyone gets this box. I was complete in the dark about what book it was going to be. I was very pleased with the book, it is a book I had added to my Goodreads 'want to read' list. Now lets talk about the 'exclusive features'. It has beautiful art work on the inner dust jacket and obviously is signed, this is lovely and the book itself is a stunning teal/turquoise colour. I have read 2 or 3 chapters already and I can tell I am going to enjoy this book. It does tend to take me longer to ready standard books now compared to my read time with eBooks, mostly because I tend to have the most time to read at night, and my husband doesn't like the light on. So it is much easier to simply pick up my Kindle rather than my every piling up real books.

Overall I am in love with Fairyloot. My subscription will be continuing and I am Keen to get some of the standalone release editions of new books. I will be getting my husband to order the 'Queen of Nothing' box as I am just going to love it, I can tell. If you are on the fence, get one, try it, I believe it is seriously good value.