Publisher: Candlewick
Publication date: April 2012
Pages: 464
Source: e-book from NetGalley
For: Review
Things I Liked:
The setting was very atmospheric - I loved the Japanese-inspired culture and clothing and words. The story itself is not easy or simple. I like that it took the Cinderella story and made it something completely different. Especially at the end. Those kinds of fairy tale retellings tend to be the best. The touches of magic were perfect and I found myself invested in the story, particularly devouring the end faster than the beginning and middle. It was both disturbing and beautiful, sweet and terrible. A unique kind of fairy tale retelling, for sure.
Things I Didn't Like:
I really didn't much care for Suzume/Rin/Yue in any of her places or characters. I can see how she has some serious problems, but they way she reacted to those things just felt disturbingly wrong. I hated her obsession with revenge and how that turned out to be ok in the end. Her cutting was well-handled I thought (though I'm pretty ignorant in that area), but I just felt like it was never resolved positively. I am not sure what, overall, bothers me most about this book, but something held me back from enjoying it. The ending was not terribly satisfying, but was a little too neat and uncomplicated for the dark way the rest of the story felt. It has some very good writing and setting, some hard issues, some deep topics, but it also did not feel like it wanted to resolve those issues. However, it definitely left me thinking.
Read-alikes:
Briar Rose by Jane Yolen
BOOK CONTENT RATINGS:
s-factor: none
that I can remember
mrg-factor: XX
mostly implied with a few non-graphic scenes
v-factor: ->->->
several rather disturbing scenes
Overall rating: ***
What kinds of books are you divided in your feelings about - both liking and disliking it about equally?
If you buy through my Amazon linkage, I will get a very small percentage
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