Kalynn Bayron

""Cenicienta lleva muerta doscientos años. Estoy enamorada de mi mejor amiga y los soldados me persiguen". Han transcurrido doscientos años desde que Cenicienta encontrara a su príncipe, pero el cuento se ha acabado. Ahora las jóvenes adolescentes son requeridas para asistir al baile anual, donde los hombres del reino seleccionan a sus esposas en base al despliegue de galas y atuendos de las jóvenes. Las chicas que no son elegidas desaparecen sin dejar rastro. Sophia es una joven de dieciséis años que preferiría más que nada en el mundo casarse con Erin, su mejor amiga, antes que desfilar delante de los pretendientes. Al llegar al baile, toma la decisión desesperada de huir y acaba ocultándose en el mausoleo de la princesa. Allí conocerá a Constance, descendiente de una de las hermanastras de Cenicenta"--

Cenicienta Ha Muerto

HaruHaru

** spoiler alert **
           Alright bear with me because I’m going to get in a long in-depth review. 

I went into this book with very high expectations: a retelling of Cinderella, a poc as the main character and lgbtq+ representation? What could go wrong!

Well. 

I didn’t hate the book, don’t get me wrong, I actually enjoyed it sometimes and it was a very light read, which is always nice to see, but man, did it left me disappointed. Let’s start with what I enjoyed, shall we? 

I really liked the changes on the original Cinderella story, how the original antagonists (the stepmother & stepsisters) were actually good people, as it puts behind the recurring trope of women being evil against women. The king’s powers were very cool too, and it added an interesting gore touch to the retelling. The mention of the grimm brothers (now turned into women, very cool) was a nice touch, and the fact that they knew the truth was one of my favorite parts, as well as the fairy godmother actually being a witch. Of course, I cannot leave behind the lgbtq+ and poc inclusion (specially the fact that the author didn’t add racism to the plot), by far the most attractive part of the book. But, sadly, this is as far as I can go with the positives.

Regarding the negative, I would like to start with the world building. How big is Lille, exactly? How are the surroundings of Mersailles? We are told of the White Forest, the forbidden lands and neighboring reigns, but they are only introduced once and never talked about ever again. Where the other reigns real or just an invention of the king? To be put as such a dangerous place, the forest was quite easy for them to cross, wasn’t it? Am I to believe the wolves ONLY smelled the horse? And on top of it, right next to their destination? Quite convenient. Everyone talks about very scary creatures, we are told they exist, but never shown once.
Not enough information on how taxes work either, the king mentions the trade of humans gave him a lot of money, but isn’t he an outrageously rich king? Why would he need to do that?

The motives of Prince Charming… what? I didn’t understand a single thing of that bit. He’s evil because… Cinderella didn’t love him?? Ah. Again, I have to believe he started to kill women left and right and make them live in hell because… hum, well, because he’s just mad at Cinderella? The man gets rejected once 200 hundred years ago and is mad at women for eternity. Alright, okay. Plus, do people really buy the story of every king choosing a successor on a foreign land? And the fact that NONE of the kings got married and had children? Everyone is supposed to get married except for the king. That’s suspicious, that’s weird.

Did Cinderella not have… a name??? Was Cinderella her birth name? It is stablished that Prince Charming wasn’t the king’s real name, and they even go as far as to wonder what the name was, but they never stop to consider Cinderella’s, which is… strange, specially considering the fact that Cinderella is an offensive nickname made up by the stepsisters in the original fairytale.

Regarding the characters, oh boy. I would like to really get into why I didn’t like them, but I just can’t, there is nothing to say. All of them were so shallow, so one dimensional and lacking of development… 

I specially didn’t like Sophia. She never wants to understand anyone’s feelings, acts on impulse and talks back to everyone. Her motives are completely valid, but she villanizes everyone for not doing anything when it is pretty stablished that if anyone does something out of place they will be immediately killed. She even witnesses not one but two public executions, both of them of people she knew and one of them being her GRANDMOTHER. We also don’t really know much about her and are always told of what she likes and dislikes, but she never acts upon those things, which makes her really boring and, again, one dimensional. Same thing with the rest of the characters. The more interesting character was Amina by far, and she dies before we could know what was on her head after everything ensues.

Another negative point: instalove. Her romance with Constance felt very bland and forced and there wasn’t enough moments for me to believe they loved each other. They didn’t know each other for that long and only knew the bare minimum of each other’s personalities (like the reader, essentially), so I couldn’t believe their love story. I give it points for being f/f, but that obviously doesn’t justify the lack of development. 

Last but not least, the ending. I… don’t really know how good a 16 (????, do we even know her age?) year old Constance was as a ruler. Her character traits are “good with the sword and brave”, and that’s it. She is the legitimate queen, fair, but what training did she have on leading a COUNTRY? …None, as far as we know. Of course the king didn’t rule by himself, he probably had a council or something, which was 100% made of men. And as every single man in this story (except for 3) are evil, they surely didn’t help Constance. And Constance is just a teenager, she cannot rule on her own. So what did they do…? Again, we are not shown, and again, another plot-hole ensues.

Ultimately, this was a book with a lot of potential wasted, with too many plot-holes and too little depth. It is not atrocious, it is very entertaining, and I believe you can enjoy it if you don’t think too much about it, but it definitely could have been better.

Silver Hastings

Cenicienta ha muerto nos cuenta una versión más oscura y desgarradora que la original. Debo admitir que me ha sorprendido muchísimo y para bien. Me ha hecho reír, casi llorar, sentir rabia por situaciones que se podían controlar. Pero sobretodo me ha hecho sentir esperanza. Siempre habrá alguien que se atreva a luchar contra esas injusticias aunque los demás guarden silencio, alguien que alzará la voz y hará todo lo posible por cambiar la situación. 

"Creo que a veces cometemos el error de pensar que los monstruos son espantosas aberraciones, acechando en los rincones más oscuros, pero la verdad es algo mucho más inquietante. Los hombres más monstruosos son aquellos que se sientan a plena vista, pidiéndote que los desafíes."

Cenicienta Ha Muerto

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