It starts out as a coming of age story with fantastic elements and devolves a bit into episodic stories with nothing in common but the main character. To me, these are Alice in Wonderland rip offs and they bother me. The writing is nice but the plot suffers more as the story nears it's end. I have read one previous book by Valente - the first book in the Fairyland series. It had the exact same problem and I refuse to keep reading the series. I do however have 5-6 more of her books on my reading list, but I think if they all end up like this, I may not finish many more.
I am a huge Valente fan and was excited to read this retelling of Snow White by her. This was a stark, yet well done retelling of Snow White set in the Wild West. I ended up enjoying it.
The whole story is set in Nevada in the gold-rush era. Initially Snow is pretty much left to her own devices and pampered by her much absent father. Everything is all good until he remarries and Snow's new stepmom is determined to wash the sin off Snow and turn her into a real lady. Of course our free-spirited Snow can't tolerate this and ends up flying off to have adventures of her own.
This is a gritty and stark retelling of the Snow White tale and is told in a beautiful yet simple style. Snow comes across as both naive and extremely wise in the ways of man as the story progresses. I loved Snow's voice and the way the story was told. It was poetic in its own way.
Overall I would recommend to those who enjoy fairy tale retellings. This is a unique retelling of Snow White in a Wild West setting. The writing is somewhat poetic in its starkness and is a bit ambiguous at times. I really enjoyed it and thought the way it was written really conveyed Snow's personality and environment well.
The whole story is set in Nevada in the gold-rush era. Initially Snow is pretty much left to her own devices and pampered by her much absent father. Everything is all good until he remarries and Snow's new stepmom is determined to wash the sin off Snow and turn her into a real lady. Of course our free-spirited Snow can't tolerate this and ends up flying off to have adventures of her own.
This is a gritty and stark retelling of the Snow White tale and is told in a beautiful yet simple style. Snow comes across as both naive and extremely wise in the ways of man as the story progresses. I loved Snow's voice and the way the story was told. It was poetic in its own way.
Overall I would recommend to those who enjoy fairy tale retellings. This is a unique retelling of Snow White in a Wild West setting. The writing is somewhat poetic in its starkness and is a bit ambiguous at times. I really enjoyed it and thought the way it was written really conveyed Snow's personality and environment well.
