Book Description:
The clock chimes midnight, a curse breaks, and a girl meets a prince . . . but what follows is not all sweetness and sugarplums.
New York City, 1899. Clara Stole, the mayor's ever-proper daughter, leads a double life. Since her mother's murder, she has secretly trained in self-defense with the mysterious Drosselmeyer.
Then, on Christmas Eve, disaster strikes.
Her home is destroyed, her father abducted--by beings distinctly not human. To find him, Clara journeys to the war-ravaged land of Cane. Her only companion is the dethroned prince Nicholas, bound by a wicked curse. If they're to survive, Clara has no choice but to trust him, but his haunted eyes burn with secrets--and a need she can't define. With the dangerous, seductive faery queen Anise hunting them, Clara soon realizes she won't leave Cane unscathed--if she leaves at all.
Inspired by The Nutcracker, Winterspell is a dark, timeless fairy tale about love and war, longing and loneliness, and a girl who must learn to live without fear.
This started off so great! Everything was set up for an amazing adventure and story. The overall story idea was great however the execution of parts of the story really bothered me.
Lets discuss...
Clara is a girl who is the daughter of the mayor. Her mother having been murdered she then secretly trains in self-defense by her Godfather. She leads a very lonely life due to politics and now the fact that she will almost engaged to a horrible man who seeks to rule over and who is quite a perv. Gross. When at her Godfather's shop he is always workings on things and growing up her one good friend was this metal statue of a guy. Someone she always talked to and divulged her secrets to.
On Christmas Eve something crazy happens and Clara's godfather comes barging in during an important political event to save her life. When non-human beings come they abduct Clara's father and an amazing thing happens... the metal statue guy comes to life! Come to find out that he is a dethroned prince who was bound by a evil curse, placed upon him by Queen Anise who now rules his rightful kingdom. With him, Clara sets off to save her father and help Nicholas reclaim his throne.
When Clara arrives in this kingdom it's cold and nothing like Nicholas remembers. When Nicholas and Clara are found out they have to hid themselves in order to survive and not be captured by the Queen.
I actually like Clara as a character at first, I thought that she was realistic and someone I could relate to. As the story progresses I found her to be fickle and a pushover. She lacked self esteem and a backbone which isn't altogether bad, but it got really annoying. Nicholas was a GREAT male lead...at first...then he too because fickle, stupid and annoying. I understand making mistakes but it was poorly written. He changed too fast to one thing and then changed again. The switching back and forth was just poorly written. He would jerk Clara around that I was like, "well no wonder she is confused about herself!" I mean really? come on...
The Queen Anise was cool...at first. I liked her I liked what the author did with her. And then she fell flat and weird and I was like... wait.... what?! And what was up with the whole Bi-sexual thing going on? Then again I guess I can understand what they author was trying to do but it didn't really fit the story I felt like the author put it in there just to put it in there.
Overall I really liked where the author was taking the story and her imagination and the idea that it derived from. But there were things in here that I didn't like and the characters lacked a good character development for a smooth transition.
Sexual Content: moderate PG-13 (kissing that was expected to go further, girl on girl action, characters in a whore house, plenty of innuendos)
Violence: moderate (fighting scenes, killings, cruel and abusive fairies)
Drugs/Alcohol: moderate PG (characters getting drunk, drinking at parties and dinner)
Language: moderate PG
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