Holly Black Returns to Elfhame with Illustrated Tales, 3 Nov

Holly Black is heading back to Faerie.

The collection gathers six stories, including two previously unpublished tales, with full-colour illustrations by Solenne Songer. For anyone yet to meet Jude and Cardan, the same report points to The Cruel Prince as the more useful starting point.

The hardcover is published by Alvina Ling Books and Hachette Book Group and runs to 272 pages, according to ScreenRant. That outlet has also published an exclusive excerpt, and describes the book as an illustrated short-story collection set in the worlds of The Folk of the Air and Modern Tales of Faerie.

A Publishers Weekly listing of titles due the week of 2 November gives the price as $22.99 and credits the book to Frostbite Studios, Little, Brown and Ling. Bookishelf's entry confirms the 3 November publication date and the Alvina Ling Books imprint.

One small discrepancy is worth flagging: Bookishelf's data lists 261 pages, while ScreenRant gives 272. Page counts often shift between listings and final copies, so it is worth checking the finished edition if length matters to you.

Short fiction has long been part of how Black builds out this universe. As Wikipedia's overview of the series records, the Folk of the Air books have been accompanied by companion pieces, among them A Visit to the Impossible Lands, The Lost Sisters, Letters from Cardan to Jude in Exile and How the King of Elfhame Learned To Hate Stories.

Several of those were initially tied to retailer editions or limited formats, so a single illustrated hardcover is a different proposition. It also reflects the series' reach across Black's wider body of work: the same overview notes that characters from her earlier Modern Tale of Faerie trilogy and her standalone novel The Darkest Part of the Forest appear in the Folk of the Air books, placing them in one shared world.

The headline addition here is the pairing of new prose with Songer's colour artwork. Beyond the two unpublished stories, the sources available to us do not specify which other tales the collection reprints.

The Cruel Prince launches the Folk of the Air trilogy with a mortal girl's dangerous bid for power inside the treacherous courts of Faerie. It is a New York Times bestselling opener, and, per Black's own site, was nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award.

Because the new collection draws on the worlds of both series, it is most naturally read by those already invested in Jude, Cardan and their orbit. Readers who want the full sequence will also want The Wicked King next; see our review of The Wicked King.

Want the full verdict? For LuvemBooks' assessment of the series opener, read our review of The Cruel Prince.