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The Rebel Prince
Regan, who has no telepathic powers, unlike the rest of the Uppers, the aristocrats who rule the plane Plateau, marries Gareth, the secret leader of the resistance movement
10 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published March 2, 2011
7 people are currently reading
107 people want to read
About the author
Sharon Green
148 books109 followersBorn and raised in Brooklyn, NY. Attended New York University and graduated with a B.A. in 1963. Married in 1963, had three sons, divorced in 1976. Raised the sons, Andy, Brian and Curtis, alone in New Jersey. Worked for AT&T as a shareowner correspondent, then as an all-around assistant in a construction company, then sold bar steel for an import firm. Left that job as assistant sales manager. I've been writing full time since 1984.
Hobbies: knitting, crocheting, Tae Kwon Do, fencing, archery, shooting, jigsaw puzzles, logic problems, math problems, not cooking.
Don't do my own research, since if I did I'd stay with that and never get any writing done. I usually can finish a novel of about 120,000 words in about three months.
Hobbies: knitting, crocheting, Tae Kwon Do, fencing, archery, shooting, jigsaw puzzles, logic problems, math problems, not cooking.
Don't do my own research, since if I did I'd stay with that and never get any writing done. I usually can finish a novel of about 120,000 words in about three months.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
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January 3, 2013This is truly a romance, with a sci-fi veneer. I could never bring myself to recommend it to someone else, but I first read it as a teenager, and it still sits on my shelf. And occasionally I re-read it. Guiltily.
June 27, 2017
I read this mainly as an exercise to see what my adult vs. teen-age brain thought of it. Both my adult and teen-age brain agree that the heroine should never have ended up with the hero of the story.
The basics of this story (and this story is pretty basic) are that Regan Edolin is rejected by her family due to her lack of the Talent her bloodline should possess and sent out into the Cluster with a generous allowance to live her life as best she can. She succeeds with a vengeance and creates Ugly Duckling Enterprises, a corporation that specializes in turnarounds of failing businesses. However she is alone and lonely, extremely wealthy and extremely unhappy. In other words, she can't relate to men, and drives them away (this is a romance novel, so clearly this is the Most Important Thing).
She receives a summons back to her families planet, and decides to go along in order to throw her success in the face of her father who abused her as a child and then rejected her. When she arrives, she discovers that she was called back to the planet to be married under local law which allows her father to give her away. Worse she is going to be married to a Below. Plateau society is separated between such creatively named castes as Uppers, Belows, and Slugs (guards). As part of the ceremony, she is conditioned to obey her new husband regardless of her wishes, to such an extent that he can order her to feel any emotion he wants.
Shattered by her fathers betrayal, disgusted by her new husband/owner, and dazed by her change in circumstances, she stumbles through the next several days alternating between icy insolence and numb disbelief. The write repeatedly emphasizes her harsh tongue, which she uses against her new captors.
Her husband who is a local rebelling against her family also despises her.
(Trigger Warning: Rape)
He needs to consummate the marriage in order to solidify the link that allows him to control her and on which his plan for the rebellion rests. He is so disgusted by her that he gets drunk in order to do the deed and rapes her. The text doesn't really consider the fact that it would be rape whether he was drunk or not.
The next segment of the book lays out the truly terrible conditions under which the lower caste of the planet suffers, and the eminently reasonable causes of the rebellion. Regan just wants to get off the planet, away from the whole situation and back to her corporation. Her husband needs her to enter the Thirty, a winner-take-all competition that determines the next Grand Prince.
The governing structure of the planet is gradually revealed to be a genetically and eugenically engineered experiment to provide the original founders complete control of society, immense wealth, and utter domination of their society. They control their wives, and their wives Talents control the population.
Resistance by the lower caste is punished by Sick Days, Work Days, and Love Days, where a wife's psionic suggestion is amplified and broadcast to across the planet near the Plateau upon which the ruling caste's city is built and for which the planet is named. Regan's change of heart is effected by experiencing care and compassion (notably lacking in her life) from a lower caste family, who then tragically lose a child to a Sick Day.
Over the course of several chapters Regan is being "educated" in families, the realities of Below living, and in sex. Her husband is deeply remorseful about having raped her...and so goes on to use his power over her to "remove" her trauma and tries to instead provide her with good sexual experiences instead. The book here suffers from not embracing it's own convictions. Instead of leaning into its romance novel tropes and providing explicit and erotic sex scenes, it is just...limp. Meanwhile Regan is seduced over her (entirely valid and reasonable!) protests. In reality, its just a less violent and more insidious rape, but romance! so it is not treated that way.
There are outside powers in the Cluster that are suspicious about the way that Plateau was founded and have inserted agents to help. Regan repeatedly uses her powers of analysis to correctly predict the failure of her husbands plans, which makes him look bad. Everyone tells her she needs to avoid making him look bad because it will hurt his pride.
Eventually (as Regan starts to warm up to her husband) they settle on their plan to enter the Thirty with the oversight of the Cluster government to enforce a fair contest. Regan is revealed to have ALL the Talents (because of course). She plays a practical joke during a training run and her husband goes off in a huff.
She seeks comfort in the arms of another galactic citizen but finds it unsatisfactory compared to what she has experienced with her husband and starts trying to win him back. At this point the usual willful misunderstanding trope of the romance novel kicks into high gear and and everyone gets really dumb and unable to talk about their feelings.
They finish their training, and enter the the Thirty. Regan's husband defeats and kills multiple princes in single combat, including Regan's father. They then confront the Grand Prince who is (surprise!) actually both Gareth's (Regan's husband) father AND grandfather (he raped his own daughter and then made her bear the child, and then eventually exiled them both, just in case you were worried he was not a Bad Dude). Gareth kills him of course.
At this point, the Cluster government sweeps in, determines that the leadership of Plateau is a separate species due to all their genetic and eugenic meddling and that they can't be allowed to leave. Regan, after all her troubles is to be exiled to a small island with a bunch of people who hate her and whose power structure she overthrew (Good plan, Cluster Government!). Her only hope is if she can work it out with her husband, who throws a wrench in the plan by saying that if she goes, he goes.
Now everything will be happily ever after, and surprise! one of her multiple Talents has allowed her to slowly break the conditioning that was imposed on her.
I got progressively more and more annoyed at this book over writing this review, if you can't tell.
The basics of this story (and this story is pretty basic) are that Regan Edolin is rejected by her family due to her lack of the Talent her bloodline should possess and sent out into the Cluster with a generous allowance to live her life as best she can. She succeeds with a vengeance and creates Ugly Duckling Enterprises, a corporation that specializes in turnarounds of failing businesses. However she is alone and lonely, extremely wealthy and extremely unhappy. In other words, she can't relate to men, and drives them away (this is a romance novel, so clearly this is the Most Important Thing).
She receives a summons back to her families planet, and decides to go along in order to throw her success in the face of her father who abused her as a child and then rejected her. When she arrives, she discovers that she was called back to the planet to be married under local law which allows her father to give her away. Worse she is going to be married to a Below. Plateau society is separated between such creatively named castes as Uppers, Belows, and Slugs (guards). As part of the ceremony, she is conditioned to obey her new husband regardless of her wishes, to such an extent that he can order her to feel any emotion he wants.
Shattered by her fathers betrayal, disgusted by her new husband/owner, and dazed by her change in circumstances, she stumbles through the next several days alternating between icy insolence and numb disbelief. The write repeatedly emphasizes her harsh tongue, which she uses against her new captors.
Her husband who is a local rebelling against her family also despises her.
(Trigger Warning: Rape)
He needs to consummate the marriage in order to solidify the link that allows him to control her and on which his plan for the rebellion rests. He is so disgusted by her that he gets drunk in order to do the deed and rapes her. The text doesn't really consider the fact that it would be rape whether he was drunk or not.
The next segment of the book lays out the truly terrible conditions under which the lower caste of the planet suffers, and the eminently reasonable causes of the rebellion. Regan just wants to get off the planet, away from the whole situation and back to her corporation. Her husband needs her to enter the Thirty, a winner-take-all competition that determines the next Grand Prince.
The governing structure of the planet is gradually revealed to be a genetically and eugenically engineered experiment to provide the original founders complete control of society, immense wealth, and utter domination of their society. They control their wives, and their wives Talents control the population.
Resistance by the lower caste is punished by Sick Days, Work Days, and Love Days, where a wife's psionic suggestion is amplified and broadcast to across the planet near the Plateau upon which the ruling caste's city is built and for which the planet is named. Regan's change of heart is effected by experiencing care and compassion (notably lacking in her life) from a lower caste family, who then tragically lose a child to a Sick Day.
Over the course of several chapters Regan is being "educated" in families, the realities of Below living, and in sex. Her husband is deeply remorseful about having raped her...and so goes on to use his power over her to "remove" her trauma and tries to instead provide her with good sexual experiences instead. The book here suffers from not embracing it's own convictions. Instead of leaning into its romance novel tropes and providing explicit and erotic sex scenes, it is just...limp. Meanwhile Regan is seduced over her (entirely valid and reasonable!) protests. In reality, its just a less violent and more insidious rape, but romance! so it is not treated that way.
There are outside powers in the Cluster that are suspicious about the way that Plateau was founded and have inserted agents to help. Regan repeatedly uses her powers of analysis to correctly predict the failure of her husbands plans, which makes him look bad. Everyone tells her she needs to avoid making him look bad because it will hurt his pride.
Eventually (as Regan starts to warm up to her husband) they settle on their plan to enter the Thirty with the oversight of the Cluster government to enforce a fair contest. Regan is revealed to have ALL the Talents (because of course). She plays a practical joke during a training run and her husband goes off in a huff.
She seeks comfort in the arms of another galactic citizen but finds it unsatisfactory compared to what she has experienced with her husband and starts trying to win him back. At this point the usual willful misunderstanding trope of the romance novel kicks into high gear and and everyone gets really dumb and unable to talk about their feelings.
They finish their training, and enter the the Thirty. Regan's husband defeats and kills multiple princes in single combat, including Regan's father. They then confront the Grand Prince who is (surprise!) actually both Gareth's (Regan's husband) father AND grandfather (he raped his own daughter and then made her bear the child, and then eventually exiled them both, just in case you were worried he was not a Bad Dude). Gareth kills him of course.
At this point, the Cluster government sweeps in, determines that the leadership of Plateau is a separate species due to all their genetic and eugenic meddling and that they can't be allowed to leave. Regan, after all her troubles is to be exiled to a small island with a bunch of people who hate her and whose power structure she overthrew (Good plan, Cluster Government!). Her only hope is if she can work it out with her husband, who throws a wrench in the plan by saying that if she goes, he goes.
Now everything will be happily ever after, and surprise! one of her multiple Talents has allowed her to slowly break the conditioning that was imposed on her.
I got progressively more and more annoyed at this book over writing this review, if you can't tell.
November 11, 2025
A fantasy story taking place on a far away planet where a dual -natured heroine and scarred hero find that by working together, they can topple an entire world. One of Ms. Green's most delightful stories.
February 23, 2021
Love this book, which I see as a thinly disguised feminist allegory against patriarchy .Like her Jalav and The Terrillian series.
January 29, 2012
I liked the blending series, so thought I would give this a try. But I couldn't even finish it.
1) rape and more thinly veiled raped under the guise of 'conditioning.' Nope. (And then her enjoying it??? ..no comment ...)
2) The heroine was excessively inconsistent (beyond the normal person and beyond a book character). She was a bitch. Yes there is back story to give reasoning, but completely unlikeable and never does anything to prove otherwise.
3) 50% way through the book, nothing had really happened but a lot of traveling. I finally gave up wanting to read about the Thirty.
I thought the world could have proved to be interesting, but it just never got there. Instead reading about the fighting between Regan and Gareth. How many times could she call him a creature. We got it after the first 236 times, she doesn't care for him. You would think someone dumped by her family would maybe give others shit on by them (the royals) a chance. No. she was stuck in her own attitude, which just. got. old.
1) rape and more thinly veiled raped under the guise of 'conditioning.' Nope. (And then her enjoying it??? ..no comment ...)
2) The heroine was excessively inconsistent (beyond the normal person and beyond a book character). She was a bitch. Yes there is back story to give reasoning, but completely unlikeable and never does anything to prove otherwise.
3) 50% way through the book, nothing had really happened but a lot of traveling. I finally gave up wanting to read about the Thirty.
I thought the world could have proved to be interesting, but it just never got there. Instead reading about the fighting between Regan and Gareth. How many times could she call him a creature. We got it after the first 236 times, she doesn't care for him. You would think someone dumped by her family would maybe give others shit on by them (the royals) a chance. No. she was stuck in her own attitude, which just. got. old.
January 8, 2011
I really enjoyed this book. I still remember it after twenty years. This book was one of the first I'd read where there was rape as plot device yet it wasn't for something arousing. It was a heinous crime against an innocent.
The world Ms. Green created was unique to me and well ahead of its time. Every scene in this book was good for me and flowed well into the next. There was betrayal, loyalty and rebel forces against a tyranny. How could I not like this book?
The world Ms. Green created was unique to me and well ahead of its time. Every scene in this book was good for me and flowed well into the next. There was betrayal, loyalty and rebel forces against a tyranny. How could I not like this book?
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