Tithe [Paperback]

Holly Black (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 3, 2003

A gripping tale of a teenage girl finding out how different she is - and how she must use her ingenuity to survive, and save her friends. A teenage girl goes back to her childhood home - the place where she used to talk to faeries. Coming up to Hallowe'en, she meets her old friends - and Roibin, who tells her his true name. Discovering the truth about herself, she agrees to go along with a plan to disrupt the human sacrifice that binds her faery friends to unkind masters. But she is to be the human sacrifice, and not everyone has been telling her the truth...

Editorial Reviews

Review

This is a tremendous first novel by American writer Holly Black. Set alternately in a modern-day New Jersey of trailer parks and grubby curtains and an amoral dazzling Faery court, where the faeries will as soon stab through your eye or seduce you as look at you, it follows the adventures of 16-year-old Kaye. A fast-paced opening finds Kaye drinking too much at a party, being groped by her best friend's boyfriend, discovering she has magical powers and rescuing a charismatic faery knight. She then becomes dangerously involved in feuding faerie kingdoms and faces death, betrayal and torture as she moves between the real world and Faery. The story is told in the third person, but almost wholly from Kaye's viewpoint. Consequently the reader identifies closely with her and becomes absorbed in her conflicting desires to help her friends, humiliate the arrogant Kenny, pursue her obsession with the enigmatic faery knight and establish her own moral values of right and wrong. Older teenagers and adults will be captivated by the combination of stirring adventure, erotically charged romance and the startling accuracy of the teen dialogue. The descriptions of the faery kingdom and the creatures who inhabit it are a Breughellian whirl of colour and detail. These faeries are wild, violent and completely inhuman, and the faery court is hedonistic, cloying and brutish. Indeed the descriptions of that world seem more sharp and in focus than the dreamlike quality of the abandoned New Jersey pier and the woods behind Kaye's grandmother's dingy, labyrinthine home. Holly Black has created a stunning adventure with a fabulous spirited heroine that's also a fable about growing up and coping with the glamour and barely concealed evils of the adult world. It captures all the magic of an 'other' world and the thrill and uncertainty of adolescence in a shimmering, disturbing adventure. An outstanding debut. Ages 14+ (Kirkus UK)

About the Author

Holly Black spent her early years in a decaying Victorian mansion where her mother fed her a steady diet of ghost stories and faerie tales. An avid collector of rare folklore volumes, spooky dolls, and crazy hats, she lives in West Long Branch, New Jersey, with her husband, Theo. This is her first book. For more information, visit www.blackholly.com.

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's (February 3, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0689837070
• ISBN-13: 978-0689837074
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,996,112 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Hi! I'm Holly Black, and I write contemporary fantasy of all different sorts. Some of my titles include TITHE, VALIANT (winner of the Andre Norton Award), IRONSIDE, the Spiderwick Chronicles (with Tony DiTerlizzi), the graphic novel series The Good Neighbors (with Ted Naifeh), and the new mobster fantasy series The Curse Workers, which includes WHITE CAT and the forthcoming RED GLOVE. I have also co-edited three anthologies, GEEKTASTIC, ZOMBIES VS. UNICORNS and WELCOME TO BORDERTOWN. I live in western Massachusetts with my husband, artist Theo Black, and several odd cats in a house with a secret library.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Book price is a rip off, January 21, 2006

By 

Kat Lady "Kat Lady" (Northeast PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tithe (Paperback)

Not sure why this book is being sold for $70 and more on this site, when it is still readily available at any book store. Don't get me wrong, it's a wonderful book, and worth it, but this seems a little dishonest to customers. The book can be bought for less than $10 pretty much anywhere.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vermont Fan, December 29, 2010

By 

BARBARA (RUTLAND, VT, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Tithe (Modern Faerie Tale) (Kindle Edition)

I am 61 years old and I picked this book up for my niece but the cover intrigued me soo I started to read it. I have read it 6 times icluding the sequel Ironside. I assumed Holly Black was a writer just for kids. Boy was I wrong. She is like J K Rowlings her books are soo well written the are for all generations. Bravo! Ms. Black . I am now reading YA authors that I would have never read before your books and for that I thank you.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars my favorite book, July 27, 2004

By 

T. Barr "reader" (Mont. Alabama) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tithe (Paperback)

this book follows Kaye who finds out she is a changeling( which is a faerie that was made to look like a human child and the faeries took the human child). This book makes makes Faeries non-perfect, cause both the "good" and "bad" sides are pretty much trying to kill her. Kinad like the book WAR OF THE OAKS but much better. Holly Black is writting a sequel to tithe called valiant due out in summer 05 i cant wait. I read this book 3 times in a row and it gets better every time. The perfect urban fantasy.