I absolutely adored this book. I finished this book literal minutes before I had to leave for work & school, but I couldn’t stop reading it when I was so close to the end! Julie did such a phenomenal job with this story, it was everything I could have wanted and then some.
This book has everything: a Cinderella retelling, a Bachelor-esque TV show, LGBTQIA+ rep, plus-sized female powerhouse lead, alllll the fashion, positive step-family relationships…shall I continue? I will read basically any retelling of a fairy tale I can find (there are very limited exceptions to this) and Cinderella is one of my go-to instareads. My partner will make fun of me for the amount of different versions of Cinderella I will read/watch, but he does listen patiently as I describe all of them to him. This has got to be one of my favorite ones I have consumed in a while though for sure. It isn’t often that I see a body-positive book where there isn’t some element of toxic body positivity in the storyline, and with Cinderella specifically there is always some level of step-family negative dynamics but both of these were completely missing from this story. Was there tension in the family? Sure, but not more than normal family tension surrounding stressful situations and I appreciated that so much. It is so nice to see normalization of mixed families and that step-families don’t need to be toxic/hateful things.
Also, reality tv is a total guilty pleasure, and I loved getting to live out watching reality tv without having to actually participate in watching reality tv. There is a very addictive quality about these shows and it translated well in print – which surprised me (not sure why). It was really fun to see the “behind the scenes” of a tv show that was relatable even if you don’t watch what it is modeled after.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I have already recommended it to many people. I would love to read more in this world but I was so pleased with the ending too. This is a book I am going to hold close to my heart in terms of Cinderella retellings for a long while. 5/5