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A review by elisabeth_julia
The Forbidden Wish by Jessica Khoury
4.0
Whoa!! I’ll jump straight into it: This book delivered EVERYTHING I needed from it.
"The Forbidden Wish" is an enchanting Aladdin fairy-tale retelling. The difference to the original story is: He doesn't fall for the princess and shows her the world. Instead, he falls in love with the jinni - and she shows him the world.
The Forbidden Wish had everything I wanted:
The Arabian world in this fairy-tale retelling is vivid and wonderful. Jessica Khoury did a magnificent job bringing letters to life. Needless to say, The Forbidden Wish was beautifully written.
The world is full of magic and so are the characters: Zhara, the powerfull jinni in the lamp and Aladdin, the charming human boy full of fire. The side characters kick ass too. Literally. They are really, really cool.
I started The Forbidden Wish before bed-time, only reading the first two chapters before I had to turn the lights off, but the next morning I grabbed it and finished it in one sitting – and that says something, because I am terribly slow at reading. I could not put The Forbidden Wish down.
The story was incredibly complex and rich for a stand-alone book. Not at one point was I able to predict the ending, and every second of reading it I feared and hoped and felt for the main characters.
The Forbidden Wish had so many different layers and yet the story is tied up nice and neatly in the end. It is such a well done, thought through book.
There was a bit too much of the romance, especially during the last third of the book. On the other hand, I know exactly that if I had read The Forbidden Wish as a teeny, I would still swoon over the romance and Aladdin would have become my top fictional crush of all times (and it would have ruined me for real life romance and all that) and I would still not be able to get over it.
Because… Aladdin is charming, cute, passionate, would take an arrow for you, couldn’t harm a fly, protects you, doesn’t mind talking about his feelings and gives you cute nick names like “Smokey” (why hasn’t anyone ever called me that?)
Zhara is passionate and dangerous and strong and kind and together they would make the perfect couple.
I thought that Aladdin’s character weakened a bit towards the end of the book and related to that there were a few tiny little issues I had with the plot later on in the story , but apart from these minor things “The Forbidden Wish” delivered every bit of what I wanted: A beautifully written fairy-tale, enthralling and enchanting, with a heart melting romance that left me breathless.
"The Forbidden Wish" is an enchanting Aladdin fairy-tale retelling. The difference to the original story is: He doesn't fall for the princess and shows her the world. Instead, he falls in love with the jinni - and she shows him the world.
The Forbidden Wish had everything I wanted:
The Arabian world in this fairy-tale retelling is vivid and wonderful. Jessica Khoury did a magnificent job bringing letters to life. Needless to say, The Forbidden Wish was beautifully written.
The world is full of magic and so are the characters: Zhara, the powerfull jinni in the lamp and Aladdin, the charming human boy full of fire. The side characters kick ass too. Literally. They are really, really cool.
I started The Forbidden Wish before bed-time, only reading the first two chapters before I had to turn the lights off, but the next morning I grabbed it and finished it in one sitting – and that says something, because I am terribly slow at reading. I could not put The Forbidden Wish down.
The story was incredibly complex and rich for a stand-alone book. Not at one point was I able to predict the ending, and every second of reading it I feared and hoped and felt for the main characters.
The Forbidden Wish had so many different layers and yet the story is tied up nice and neatly in the end. It is such a well done, thought through book.
There was a bit too much of the romance, especially during the last third of the book. On the other hand, I know exactly that if I had read The Forbidden Wish as a teeny, I would still swoon over the romance and Aladdin would have become my top fictional crush of all times (and it would have ruined me for real life romance and all that) and I would still not be able to get over it.
Because… Aladdin is charming, cute, passionate, would take an arrow for you, couldn’t harm a fly, protects you, doesn’t mind talking about his feelings and gives you cute nick names like “Smokey” (why hasn’t anyone ever called me that?)
Zhara is passionate and dangerous and strong and kind and together they would make the perfect couple.
I thought that Aladdin’s character weakened a bit towards the end of the book and related to that there were a few tiny little issues I had with the plot later on in the story