Book #30: Sweetly, by Jackson Pearce
Aug. 25th, 2011 11:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
grav_itySeriously, who sits down one day and thinks "I should re-write Hansel and Gretel"? AWESOMESAUCE.
girl power, fairy tale retelling, Buffy wishes she was this cool, again with the present tense, sisters are forever, much more amazing than Supernatural ever was on its best day, werewolves that don't suck, etc.
(Spoilers below!)
I think one of my favourite things about this book was that, in addition to not finding out that the witch was actually Fenris until far enough into the book that I was starting to doubt that it was actually a sequel, Gretchen kept thinking of them as "witch", which is just cool. Because fairy-tales migrate all the time, and I kind of adore the story for going there. Also, when Gretchen meets the first Fenris, and just knows immediately what he is What happened to my sister?....gah, my heart nearly stopped. (Also, the typesetting at that section was REALLY COOL and I'm not saying anything else. You'll have to read it.)
I really liked the explanation of Why Twins Are Important, the better to separate Gretchen from Rosie and Scarlett, and I adored how Sophia just lulled everyone to sleep (except she didn't, because you knew something was up...but not what). Because that's kind of what happens in the original fairy-tale: you don't really catch on until Hansel is in the oven. Before that, it's just weird.
I did figure this one out a lot faster than I figured out Sisters Red...but I was okay with that, because in Sisters Red, figuring it out was directly tied to Scarlet and Rosie, whereas Gretchen was coming into the world, so figuring her out separately was kind of more interesting. So this book was less of an "OMG!!!" and more of a "YOU ARE SO AWESOME!!!". (Apparently my bloodthirstiness is specific...I preferred the end of Sisters Red, but Sweetly's end was awesome in a different way.)
I really loved Gretchen. I loved watching her discover that she wasn't half a person. I loved watching her figure it out, piece by piece, like a trail of bread crumbs out of the woods (except instead of bread crumbs, it was the bullets of the various guns she learned how to use); her life, her past, what was going on and how she was connected to it. It's kind of hard to describe. But it was really well done.
(I also thought it was super cool that we didn't find out the sister's name until page 187.)
My only real recommendation for reading this book is to not start it in the middle of a thunderstorm after a tornado warning has been issued, because it will stop you from going out to buy the candy the book will make you crave. ;)
9/10 for girls who are awesome, girls who are less awesome, siblings who love each other, small towns, and gorgeous, gorgeous imagery.
girl power, fairy tale retelling, Buffy wishes she was this cool, again with the present tense, sisters are forever, much more amazing than Supernatural ever was on its best day, werewolves that don't suck, etc.
(Spoilers below!)
I think one of my favourite things about this book was that, in addition to not finding out that the witch was actually Fenris until far enough into the book that I was starting to doubt that it was actually a sequel, Gretchen kept thinking of them as "witch", which is just cool. Because fairy-tales migrate all the time, and I kind of adore the story for going there. Also, when Gretchen meets the first Fenris, and just knows immediately what he is What happened to my sister?....gah, my heart nearly stopped. (Also, the typesetting at that section was REALLY COOL and I'm not saying anything else. You'll have to read it.)
I really liked the explanation of Why Twins Are Important, the better to separate Gretchen from Rosie and Scarlett, and I adored how Sophia just lulled everyone to sleep (except she didn't, because you knew something was up...but not what). Because that's kind of what happens in the original fairy-tale: you don't really catch on until Hansel is in the oven. Before that, it's just weird.
I did figure this one out a lot faster than I figured out Sisters Red...but I was okay with that, because in Sisters Red, figuring it out was directly tied to Scarlet and Rosie, whereas Gretchen was coming into the world, so figuring her out separately was kind of more interesting. So this book was less of an "OMG!!!" and more of a "YOU ARE SO AWESOME!!!". (Apparently my bloodthirstiness is specific...I preferred the end of Sisters Red, but Sweetly's end was awesome in a different way.)
I really loved Gretchen. I loved watching her discover that she wasn't half a person. I loved watching her figure it out, piece by piece, like a trail of bread crumbs out of the woods (except instead of bread crumbs, it was the bullets of the various guns she learned how to use); her life, her past, what was going on and how she was connected to it. It's kind of hard to describe. But it was really well done.
(I also thought it was super cool that we didn't find out the sister's name until page 187.)
My only real recommendation for reading this book is to not start it in the middle of a thunderstorm after a tornado warning has been issued, because it will stop you from going out to buy the candy the book will make you crave. ;)
9/10 for girls who are awesome, girls who are less awesome, siblings who love each other, small towns, and gorgeous, gorgeous imagery.
