I reviewed Danielle Paige's other big hit, Dorothy Must Die a long time ago as my second ever review and I really liked it. It had great voice, great characters, and a gripping story. So when I saw she had started a new series based around the Snow Queen fairy tale, I got really excited. It had a good premise and promised to be a really good story. How'd it do? Well, let's dive right in.
The story is that of a young girl appropriately named Snow who has spent the vast majority of her life locked up in an insane asylum. Yet that hasn't prevented her from finding some happiness in a fellow inmate named Bale. However, when Snow shares her first kiss with Bale, he goes off the rails and breaks her wrist. Then Bale is kidnapped and taken away to a strange and magical world cursed with an eternal winter. Snow must follow Bale and get him back, but little does she know she might be the only one who has the power to stop the evil Snow King once and for all.
This book has no shortage of creativity. I knew right away when Snow is in the asylum and has named all of her medications after the Seven Dwarves. That's really clever and kinda sad. There are also some really visually interesting characters such as a River Witch made entirely out of water and a gang of female robbers who have a bottle of magic for everything you can possibly require. The descriptions of the icy cold world are very well done and Paige's voice does come out and shine as it did in her other series.
However, the book also has a few downsides. Firstly, Snow herself is not a very good main character. I stated before in my Dorothy Must Die review that the main character, Amy Gumm, starts off whiny but gradually gets better. Here, on the other hand, things take an opposite approach. Snow starts off interesting enough but as the story moves forward, she starts complaining a lot! She's selfish and uncaring and cruel and, once again, every single male character has a crush on her. Unbelievable! At least Amy cared about Oz and wanted to help the people there. Snow can't care less that she's supposed to save people and just runs away selfishly. A whole world of people is relying on her to save them and she's all like "Screw you all! I just want my boyfriend back! You all can freeze for all I care!" It's very off-putting and I just couldn't get around it. I just didn't like her at all.
The plot also is slightly similar to that of Dorothy Must Die. I don't meant to keep going back to that book, but I just can't help it. If you've read both books, you'll find a startling amount of similarities. Young girl gets sucked into magical world. Evil ruler wants to destroy her. Group of rebellious females that include one male member for her to have a crush on. It's kind of scary. However, things start to improve, plot-wise, towards the climax of the book. The ending, without giving away spoilers, was a massive roller coaster that had turns when you expected it and loops when you didn't. The whole time I was like "I saw that coming. I didn't see that coming! Saw that coming. Didn't see that coming! Ugh! I saw that coming. I did NOT see THAT coming!" It was pretty crazy and a good way to get readers psyched for the next installment.
Final Verdict
As I said, there were a lot of ups and downs with this one. Some things I liked and somethings I really didn't. Over all, I like Paige's other works a bit better than this one. However, if you still want to check it out, then check it out at your local library!
Have you read the book? What did you think? Comment below and share your thoughts.
Next Time: Can a computer choose the next bestseller? Should it?
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