I really adored this book, and I, like so many other people, related to
Cath on an incredible level. However, people related to her because of
her dedication to Simon Snow and her fangirl-y qualities, whereas I
related to her based on her mental issues. I myself suffer from
crippling social anxiety, and it infuriates me that people have been
saying that Cath just needed to "come out of her shell". THAT'S NOT HOW
SOCIAL ANXIETY WORKS. Honestly, since I know exactly what Cath was
feeling, I think she made tremendous strides in dealing with her
anxiety, and opening herself up to new things, and I applaud her for
that.
Okay, rant over, onto the review.
As far as
characters I felt that they were all very well fleshed out, and they
felt like real people to me. I loved the romance between Levi and Cath
(although Levi did piss me off a little bit there, but such is life).
I
felt that this was the perfect time for me to read this, since I too am
a freshman in college, and this book held such an important message for
me to learn; you don't have to change everything about yourself in
order to grow up, you're awesome the way you are and people will see
that and love you for it.
A Tale Dark and Grimm very much lives up to it's title, in that it is
dark, gritty, and stays very close to the original Grimm tales. My
expectations for this book were not high, mostly due to the fact that it
is a children's novel(silly me, always being a book snob. Luckily, this
book proved me wrong). I was so worried that Gidwitz would downplay the
fairy tales and make them more "child appropriate" (*cough* like Disney
*cough*), however he didn't do this at all, this book was bloody and
gory, and had all of the gruesome elements that the original tales had.
The writing, however, is not for everyone, at times the narration can be
intrusive, which doesn't bother me at all, but it might get on some
people's nerves. To me, Adam Gidwitz's writing felt very similar to
Lemony Snicket's, sometimes sassy, sometimes morbid, but still separate
from the story at hand, which makes it feel more like the story is being
told to you (which I love). Honestly, this book was almost perfect for
me, and would have received 5 stars, but the ending wasn't quite what I
wanted, but I suppose it can't be perfect all around. I think this book
would be perfect for any fairy tale lover who would like to see some of
the more obscure Grimm tales adapted to a new setting.
Cinder really exceeded all of my expectations I had going into
it. Cinder was an awesome heroine, she was flawed in all of the best
ways and so very human. I loved her relationship with her step-sister
Peony, as well as Iko, her android, I felt that making the character of
Cinderella less isolated really empowered her more. I was so worried
that the whole futuristic-cyborg element would take so much away from
the original fairytale, but I think it truly enhanced it and made it its
own story in so many ways, while still keeping that same fairytale tone
and feel that I love so much. And I loved that everything Cinder did,
she did herself.
The plot was intriguing and I found the novel to be such a page-turner.
However, I must say that the book was very predictable, and I knew
within the first few chapters what the big reveal would be at the end of
the novel. I still have to say though that this is now one of my
favorite retellings and I can't wait to read Scarlet (as well as Cress,
in February).
