TBP: Sept. 5th, 2017
400 Pages
At sixteen, Mina’s mother is dead, her magician father is vicious, and her silent heart has never beat with love for anyone—has never beat at all, in fact, but she’d always thought that fact normal. She never guessed that her father cut out her heart and replaced it with one of glass.
When she moves to Whitespring Castle and sees its king for the first time, Mina forms a plan: win the king’s heart with her beauty, become queen, and finally know love. The only catch is that she’ll have to become a stepmother.
Fifteen-year-old Lynet looks just like her late mother, and one day she discovers why: a magician created her out of snow in the dead queen’s image, at her father’s order. But despite being the dead queen made flesh, Lynet would rather be like her fierce and regal stepmother, Mina. She gets her wish when her father makes Lynet queen of the southern territories, displacing Mina.
Now Mina is starting to look at Lynet with something like hatred, and Lynet must decide what to do—and who to be—to win back the only mother she’s ever known…or else defeat her once and for all. -Goodreads
This is a Snow White retelling and it doesn’t become apparent til about half way through the book. I do not have any issue with this at all because this book was a really surprising and good read.
Before dipping into the story, there needs to be an appreciation for how the author was able to use magic within this story. It wasn’t a run of the mild magic as stated in the summary one girl has a heart of glass while the other is made of snow. The magic in this story isn’t slap in your face from beginning and end but it was powerful and there was always a thin layer of when the explosion is coming. I liked that about this book; although it had a slow start once Mina’s voice got stronger the book picked up.
I liked Mina better than Lynet. Mina was stronger, she wasn’t sheltered nor did she whine a lot. Mina has a purpose and eventually Lynet finds hers and she does become a different person but there is a strength about her that still isn’t there especially compared to Mina.
But what I really enjoyed about this book was the relationship between Mina and Lynet. There is love… genuine love between them as a mother and daughter and it was everything that I wanted in any Snow White retelling especially in the book “Fairest of All” by Serena Valentino. I really really loved seeing their relationship from the beginning to the end (I guess).
The romance in the story was alright. I would have appreciate more love and less obligation. It wasn’t a strong or even close to the mother daughter fierceness. Therefore, I didn’t feel that the romance was love and more something new,
Overall, this book is creative, I loved how it references the original fairy tale but it isn’t the original fairy tale. Although it started off slow, when it picked up, it got good.
4 Pickles
Motif by Tanya 