In New York City, Val hooks up with a strange group of homeless teens and joins them in living in an abandoned subway station. Black's second book, Valiant, picks up where Tithe leaves off, but follows a different girl - a human named Val - who catches her boyfriend and her mother in a compromising position and runs away from home. Kaye starts to piece together the strange story of her real identity when she and her mother return to the New Jersey town where she grew up, and Kaye comes in contact with the faeries she used to play with as a child and a wounded knight, Roiben, who will change her life forever. Holly Black's first Young Adult novel, the urban fantasy/faerie tale Tithe, focuses on a sixteen-year-old girl named Kaye who is actually a pixie, only at first she doesn't know it. Reading Group GuideĪ Reading Guide for TITHE, VALIANT, and IRONSIDE

Holly Black spins a seductive tale at once achingly real and chillingly enchanted, set in a dangerous world where pleasure mingles with pain and nothing is exactly as it appears. In this game of wits and weapons, can a pixie outplay a queen? Silarial wants Roiben's throne, and she will use Kaye, and any means necessary, to get it. But once back in the faerie courts, Kaye finds herself a pawn in the games of Silarial, queen of the Seelie Court. Her mother's shock and horror sends Kaye back to the world of Faerie to find her human counterpart and return her to Ironside. Miserable and convinced she belongs nowhere, Kaye decides to tell her mother the truth - that she is a changeling left in place of the human daughter stolen long ago.

Now Kaye can't see or speak to Roiben unless she can find the one thing she knows doesn't exist: a faerie who can tell a lie. But when Kaye, drunk on faerie wine, declares herself to Roiben, he sends her on a seemingly impossible quest. Uneasy in the midst of the malevolent Unseelie Court, pixie Kaye is sure of only one thing - her love for Roiben. Their adventure will take them on a dangerous path, where Kaye finds herself at the center of the battle of wits and weapons being waged over Roiben's throne.In the realm of Faerie, the time has come for Roiben's coronation. Unable to see Roiben until she has fulfilled his quest, Kaye calls upon her friends to help her. But love in the realm of faerie is no simple matter, and when Kaye declares herself to Roiben during the celebration, he sends her on a seemingly impossible quest to find a faerie who can tell a lie. Uneasy in the midst of the malevolent Unseelie Court, pixie Kaye is sure of only one thing-her love for Roiben. As bonds of love threaten to break forever, the faerie courts will never be the same in the stunning conclusion toīestseller Holly Black's critically acclaimed ModernĪs the darkest day of the year approaches, the time has come for Roiben's coronation.

Ironside holly black series