Reviews with content warning for Torture - Captive Prince

read this bc my coworker lent me the books. i liked it! super excited for the second one! living for the slow burn so far. i’m hoping for some dual pov action in the next one bc i love laurent’s character and i think his pov could be fun and interesting

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ahoyitsjoy's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

This reminded me of reading fanfic back in the real wild west days, in both the good and the bad ways. This is a real "dead dove do not eat" so look up the cws for sure. If you didn't understand that sentence then you should not read this book probably!

Aside from the often gratuitously horrific SA happening in this book, the political intrigue is really quite well done. The reader has enough info to generally figure things out ahead of the protagonist if they're paying attention. I'm hoping the next book has the shock value dialed back several notches and more of the good stuff, because I think there's potential here.

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daem_ss's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark inspiring mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Más que haber estado leyendo un libro sentí como que estaba viendo una serie épica de reinos y guerras. Me encantó la ambientación, la tensión entre los protagonistas y, sobre todo, el complot que se iba moldeando a través de las páginas. Aunque sí hubieron partes que encontraba algo innecesarias o donde me confundía, entiendo que todo formó parte de demostrar cómo funcionaban las sociedades de cada reino. Uf, estoy deseando que el segundo libro me encante aun más. 🫣

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littlecosmos's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Captive Prince is an engaging page-turner with a plot that holds the attention. The main characters have palpable chemistry, and the writing style is captivating. Although I had several questions by the end of this book, I found the answers I'd been looking for in the following two books of this series.

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ssaradve's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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vagrantheather's review against another edition

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challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

5.0

It feels very strange to have enjoyed this book so much. It opens on violence and sexual assault and gets steadily darker from there.

Captive Prince is set in what seems to be ancient city states, in the country of Vere, in whose culture "bed slaves" are normative. The main character, Damen, is of a warring city state, where he was betrayed - forced out of his country and into slavery in Vere. If it sounds like this leads to a story rife with sexual violence, you're damned right it is. But the development of scene and characters is deep, the writing beautifully rich, and the central storyline compelling.

Frankly, I would never recommend this book. The subject matter is too dark and the portrayal too explicit. But I did feel that it swept me up, engaged my brain, played with my heart, and was a total page turner. Somewhat controversially I would relate it to ASOIAF for the crown politics drama, inability to trust anyone, and dim portrayal of human nature. Book 2 is already borrowed and I'm diving straight in.

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eli_ross's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

As interesting as I found the premise of this book, it's really let down by the writing, which I found was inconsistent and underdeveloped in places. It read more like a YA novel, which is what I expected after reading the first few pages, but some of the content was very graphic. I think that if it had been written in a more sophisticated style, it would have negated the brashness of some of the darker scenes. Check the trigger warnings before reading, as others have said.

However, I enjoyed seeing the relationship evolve between Laurent and Damon. I'll be reading the second book eventually, as I'm invested in where they end up. Overall a good book if you like a quick read, and a dramatic enemies-to-(I'm assuming) lovers story.

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divine529's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

I don't even know where to begin talking about this book. I really didn't love it, but it was very engaging and intriguing, so that kept me reading. It's essentially a specific kind of "book candy" (it's not a good book, but it's compelling in a way I'm not sure I fully understand and makes me want to keep reading).

This follows our main protagonist, Damen, a prince from Akielos whose father was killed and his half-brother sent him off to be a slave in a neighboring kingdom. His master is the cruel and cold prince of Vere, Laurent. What follows is a story of cruelty, survival, pain, political intrigue and cultural clashes.

As I said above, I wasn't a huge fan of this book. I really enjoyed my time with it because of the plot and the politics. The characters aren't that loveable and I feel like we really don't know much about them by the end of the book. Plus the things Laurent put Damen through? That's a kind of trauma that doesn't sit right with me for any kind of relationship they form, even if it were to be resolved later.

The amount of rape, CSA and torture is a lot and was really rough for me to read.

Some people have said this is a sort of gay GoT and I can sort of see what they mean.

All in all, I didn't love this, but it's intriguing enough for me to want to continue on. Definitely "book candy" for me.

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