A review by rbreade
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire

The epigraph is from Howard Nemerov's poem, "Vermeer." The frame consists of the titular sister, Iris's, recollection as an old woman of her life, and of Clara's, the cinder-girl of fairytale. The frame is is told in the past tense and first person, and the story itself in the present tense and with some use of omniscience, though for much of the novel Maguire keeps the point of view in third person, close to Iris.