Can Aurora ever forgive Alyce for shapeshifting into her dragon form and destroying her home, killing so many of her former friends and relations? The initial answer seems like no, but Walter writes complex relationships that can understand that some things are bigger than their own feelings. Are creatures from both sides willing to forgive and forget to see a brighter future? This dynamic is reflected in how Alyce and Aurora’s relationship evolves. Misrule is a book about politics and compromise. It is an imperfect palace heads adorn spikes and humans are slaves, but how the High Court treated the dark creatures was also evil. Gathering demons, goblins and imps together sounds evil, but Alyce is giving them a home free from persecution. The Malice Duology refuses to paint the dark creatures as evil and the light as good. Her weakness sleeps deep within the walls of her kingdom. Alyce is the de facto Queen of all the dark creatures in the land and they look to her for guidance. Book one was an internal affair that built as the relationship between Alyce and Aurora grew. Whilst both are contained within the Kingdom of Briar, Misrule is all about how this Dark Court is affecting the wider world. What differentiates the two books is the sense of scale. One moment characters can be lovers, the next sworn enemies. As a reader you never get the chance to assume that a character is being truthful as they may turn at any point. The relationships in these books are complex and move back and forwards.

The reason Malice, and in turn Misrule, are such good retellings of Sleeping Beauty is that they refuse to be simple books. Can Alyce awaken Aurora and, if she succeeds, will their feelings be the same? Is she willing to sacrifice all her power to be with the one she loves? Not only is she a human, but a Briar Princess, the enemy of the Dark Court. Hidden deep within her private library is the sleeping form of Aurora. She stands of the precipice of taking the war to the Fairy High Court, but will her secret be her undoing. When this Princess wakes she will not be compelled and there is the messy matter of the relationship with Alyce, who has since risen to be the head of Briar.Īfter the events of Malice, Alyce has spent the decades creating her own court made up from the disenfranchised and abandoned dark magical creatures. Misrule opens 100 years later and tells the second part of the fairy tale when the Princess is awoken, but this is no simple fable. Everyone knows the story of Sleeping Beauty, or do they? Malice by Heather Walter retold the story leading up to Aurora falling asleep, but with far more detail on Aurora and her relationship with Alyce, the person responsible for her curse.

Malice misrule