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Saturday, March 13, 2010

Book Review: Beauty Sleep by Cameron Dokey

Beauty Sleep seems inevitable for the princess Aurore, cursed to sleep for 100 years and be awakened only by true love's first kiss.  Aurore, not content to be sheltered for life, convinces her parents to let her out of the palace.  She begins to make friends among the common people.  But when horrible things begin to happen in her kingdom, she must make a difficult choice between herself or her kingdom.

Beauty Sleep: A Retelling of "Sleeping Beauty" (Once Upon a Time)

Things I Liked:
This was a really fun and fairly unique retelling of Sleeping Beauty.  The story doesn't go quite how it has been told before, and that makes it more enjoyable, I thought - a few surprises mixed in with a familiar story.  I really liked Aurore and her spunky, no nonsense attitude.  She narrates her story directly and I loved her somewhat cheeky voice throughout.  There are glimpses of humor and wit throughout that make this overall an excellent read for those who can't get enough fairy tale retellings!


Things I Didn't Like:
I was disappointed that there didn't seem to be a lot of depth.  There were so many things that could have been developed more, especially the "villains."  I thought it was a really good story, but should have been more detailed and instead of simply hinting at other things that are dying to be told what, carrying that concept through.  I wanted more.


Read-alikes:
Spindle's End by Robin McKinley 

A Kiss in Time by Alex Flinn
Enchantment by Orson Scott Card
Thornspell by Helen Lowe 
Briar Rose by Jane Yolen

BOOK CONTENT RATINGS:
s-factor: none

mrg-factor: none

v-factor: none

Overall rating: ****

You know, I never really get tired of a good fairy tale retelling, even though the basic story is so familiar.  Do you?

If you buy through my Amazon linkage, I will get a very small percentage

5 comments :

  1. Hi! I just stumbled across your blog and I am so happy I did! I have a similar book review blog, and I was wondering how your rating system works. I rate on a scale of 1-5, but how do you manage your ratings?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Shaynie, there is an explanation of my ratings on the right sidebar, but in essence, s-factor is language, mrg-factor is sexual content, v-factor is violence and sometimes scary stuff. The overall rating is my subjective opinion of how much I liked it, not necessarily merit-wise (though I try to take that into consideration). Thanks for stopping by!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm afraid I also can not get enough out of the fairy tale genre. I actually just read this book too. I happen to be an a fairy tale binge lately. Don't know why. :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I've always liked Jane Yolen's Briar Rose as a Sleeping Beauty retelling and Helen Lowe's Thornspell was also good. But is 'Sleeping Beauty' getting overdone compared to some of the other fairytale retellings, I wonder?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Julie, I go in fairy tale cycles - a lot and then not many and then a lot again. Love them!

    Andie, I KNEW I was forgetting some in my read-alikes! I can't believe I didn't put Thornspell on there! I don't think Sleeping Beauty is as overdone as Beauty and the Beast.

    ReplyDelete

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