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The Stepsister Scheme by Jim C. Hines

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


A fractured fairy tale about Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White going on an adventure to rescue Cinderella's husband, the prince. Cute concept, and it is nice to know that there's another option out there for young readers who want a book about ladies (and at least one queer lady!) being awesome and going on adventures. Other than that, I found this quite boring. Too much adventuring, not enough . . . anything else.

It got more interesting when I started thinking about Cinderella as a class fantasy, and what is embedded in that. How it's about a girl raised to royalty from rags, and how we all know she deserved ascension from the start. Yet part of her deserving it is her years of physical servitude and, in many tellings, the uncomplaining way she accepted veritable slavery. Poverty is part of the making of her, and it is also used as a tool to punish those who hurt her once she is free. And etc. The book wasn't about any of this, you understand, it's just stuff I was thinking about to entertain myself.




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