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mara_miriam's review
2.0
I'm sucker for re-imagined fairy tales and the novel is well paced. That said, the letter format was not entirely effective, as it left Zell as a half-formed character. Also, I found myself more interested in the fairy godmothers than in the princesses themselves, especially because their friendships were not entirely believable to me.
popestig's review against another edition
2.0
Princesses with shit relationship skills exchange letters, using dialogue from Sex in the City.
Not entirely my cup of tea.
Not entirely my cup of tea.
sarrie's review against another edition
3.0
This was interesting, if you like chick lit you'd probably enjoy it. Its an odd combination of chick lit and fairy tale? I was a little disappointed, wanting more of the fairy tale and less of the chick lit but it was a fast read and I found a lot of the little references and drops of humor fun. It was entertaining, definitely more 'a story of three women and their friendship' kind of book. Definitely good for people who love those.
jessyhere's review against another edition
5.0
I loved this so much. Fairy tale characters usually seem pretty one dimensional. Not so in this book. All the characters are incredibly complex, even the villains and antagonists. The relationships are messy. It's a story of trying to be yourself, in spite of life's constraints. I was utterly charmed by it.
eileen_reads's review against another edition
3.0
This book was not really my thing if I'm honest, but I can't deny that it was a clever premise and rather expertly done. So I gave it three stars anyway.
jacattack13's review
3.0
I received a copy of this book from the publisher through Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.
This follows three well known fairy tale princesses, CeCi(Cinderella), Bianca(Snow White) and Rory(Sleeping Beauty) in letter form. It's basically mean girls meets Disney. One of their best friends, Zell(Rapunzel) leaves spontaneously and leaves a letter behind for her best friends to find. After that all three start writing to her telling her all about whats been happening since she left. CeCi loves to bake but feels that her position as Princess won't allow her to follow her dreams, Bianca is getting married to her best friend but they don't love each other and instead she finds someone on the Outside, and poor Rory has finally woken up only to find out that her husband is a bore and has no interest in loving her.
Things I Liked:
I like the letter format. It was unique and really different than other fairy tale retellings. Even though descriptions and settings were sparse the content in each letter was great.
All the SASS! and backstabbing and cattiness. That's what made Mean Girls=means girls. Even though all of these princesses are friends they each have their own problems and they try to solve each others problems behind backs thinking they were doing a good thing. Sometimes it got a little too much...
The ending!!! AHHHH The ending!!! So sad and yet it was amazing!
Things I Disliked:
It took a bit longer to get into the story since it is in letter format there is something missing. It's very character driven so if you are a huge character loving person this is the book. (for me it kinda depends..it works here for the story)
The cattiness does get a little old after a while and I started to skim just to get to the next letter.
But overall it was a good book but wasn't one of my favorites. It was unique and I would recommend this to readers who are interested in reading a Mean Girls type of fairy tale retelling. It's not for everyone though.
This follows three well known fairy tale princesses, CeCi(Cinderella), Bianca(Snow White) and Rory(Sleeping Beauty) in letter form. It's basically mean girls meets Disney. One of their best friends, Zell(Rapunzel) leaves spontaneously and leaves a letter behind for her best friends to find. After that all three start writing to her telling her all about whats been happening since she left. CeCi loves to bake but feels that her position as Princess won't allow her to follow her dreams, Bianca is getting married to her best friend but they don't love each other and instead she finds someone on the Outside, and poor Rory has finally woken up only to find out that her husband is a bore and has no interest in loving her.
Things I Liked:
I like the letter format. It was unique and really different than other fairy tale retellings. Even though descriptions and settings were sparse the content in each letter was great.
All the SASS! and backstabbing and cattiness. That's what made Mean Girls=means girls. Even though all of these princesses are friends they each have their own problems and they try to solve each others problems behind backs thinking they were doing a good thing. Sometimes it got a little too much...
The ending!!! AHHHH The ending!!! So sad and yet it was amazing!
Things I Disliked:
It took a bit longer to get into the story since it is in letter format there is something missing. It's very character driven so if you are a huge character loving person this is the book. (for me it kinda depends..it works here for the story)
The cattiness does get a little old after a while and I started to skim just to get to the next letter.
But overall it was a good book but wasn't one of my favorites. It was unique and I would recommend this to readers who are interested in reading a Mean Girls type of fairy tale retelling. It's not for everyone though.
iamrainbou's review
3.0
Trigger warnings: suicide ideation, emotional abuse.
This was a wonderful book. It's retelling of Snow White, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella, where they all are friends, living in a magic fairy tale world and traveling to the real world. CeCi (Cinderella), Bianca (Snow White) and Rory (Sleeping Beauty) send letters to Zell (Rapunzel) who has moved away with her family.
This is the after of "they lived happily ever after". Many problems were unsolved in these stories and really, the endings of these princesses were far from ideal. CeCi wants to go to the real world and study culinary arts. Bianca wants to explore and try everything. Rory just follows them along at first, but she has her own adventures.
The three of them are very interesting and develop characters. They struggle with what their fairy tale society tells them what they should want and what they really want. The book deals with finding yourself and your passion. At the end, they all take their own decisions.CeCi realizes that she doesn’t want to have children and opens her own restaurant. Bianca moves to the real world to live with her beautiful girlfriend. Zell leaves Jason because she realizes she is not happy with him anymore.
The book shows how powerful and beautiful friendship and platonic love is. These women fight and get angry, but never give up on each other. I loved how each marriage was very different. CeCi has problems with her husband, but they solved them, they talk and get to a better place. Bianca and her husband are actually friends and don't have romantic feelings. Zell doesn’t want to be with hers and leaves him.
They also talk about forgiveness, especially to other women. Which I really like.
On purpose, I decided not to mention Rory’s story because it’s actually very sad.Her husband is an asshole and she takes a sleeping potion at the end to wake up in 100 years. And although it is not suicide she does it because she feels alone, tired and lost. It is not the same, she’s sleeping because of magic and she will wake up eventually, but I wish, I don’t know, that she had known she is loved.
It is a very bittersweet story, but it has a hopeful ending. So yeah, if you want a fantasy book with female friendship and a bisexual princess getting her happy ending, give Letters to Zell a try.
This was a wonderful book. It's retelling of Snow White, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella, where they all are friends, living in a magic fairy tale world and traveling to the real world. CeCi (Cinderella), Bianca (Snow White) and Rory (Sleeping Beauty) send letters to Zell (Rapunzel) who has moved away with her family.
This is the after of "they lived happily ever after". Many problems were unsolved in these stories and really, the endings of these princesses were far from ideal. CeCi wants to go to the real world and study culinary arts. Bianca wants to explore and try everything. Rory just follows them along at first, but she has her own adventures.
The three of them are very interesting and develop characters. They struggle with what their fairy tale society tells them what they should want and what they really want. The book deals with finding yourself and your passion. At the end, they all take their own decisions.
The book shows how powerful and beautiful friendship and platonic love is. These women fight and get angry, but never give up on each other. I loved how each marriage was very different. CeCi has problems with her husband, but they solved them, they talk and get to a better place. Bianca and her husband are actually friends and don't have romantic feelings. Zell doesn’t want to be with hers and leaves him.
They also talk about forgiveness, especially to other women. Which I really like.
On purpose, I decided not to mention Rory’s story because it’s actually very sad.
It is a very bittersweet story, but it has a hopeful ending. So yeah, if you want a fantasy book with female friendship and a bisexual princess getting her happy ending, give Letters to Zell a try.
bookpairings's review against another edition
2.0
Man this book took forever for me to finish. At first I really liked it. I liked that the story was told from the perspective of Bianca (Snow White), Ceci (Cinderella), and Rory (Sleeping Beauty) writing letters to their friend Zell (Rapunzel). The first three princesses travel to and from “the outside” which is our world and start to discover what they really want from life and later have to struggle to tell their loved ones. Overall, it was okay, but not amazing. It was kind of slow in the middle.
utopiastateofmind's review against another edition
3.0
I definitely liked it, there were some cute "Grimm help me" and I thought the ideas behind how this world would function were quite interesting. I personally didn't forsee the end, but that's just me. I feel somewhere between a 3 and 4 but I'm not sure where I am leaning