All in all, this was a really great book. I loved the plot, the characters, and the character development (my favorite part in books, just not my favorite part when I myself am writing them!) and I was hooked – hook, line, and sinker in the first chapter and I didn’t set it down once!

The MC, Macy Queen, secludes herself from the rest of her friends and even from her own mother – trying to save herself from the grief she faces when her father died two years before. She plays safe – she makes sure she always appears calm and collected; perfect. Starting with her perfect boyfriend right down to her perfect study routine. But then she meets the whole Wish Catering gang and her whole summer turns around. There’s Kristy Palmetto and her peculiar scars, Monica Palmetto who’s anything but the outgoing, loud sprite her sister is, Delia, the pregnant owner of Wish Catering, Bert, her youngest nephew and Wes – her oldest nephew. The one who always tells Macy the truth.

I wasn’t impressed with the overall story line; it was sort of cliche and to me, the book didn’t stand out much from others like itself, and so it’s not necessarily on my favorites list. Like I already said, though, I loved the character development. Sarah Dessen definitely did a great job on that. Macy really changed by the end of the book, and I loved that about this book. One thing that did make it different was that the character development allowed Macy to grow and learn from her past throughout the book without the book feeling stilted and drawn-out.

By the end, I was very much in awe over The Truth About Forever. I really liked the characters – every character was well formed, particularly the Main Character, and I really enjoyed reading it. I’d definitely read it again, without hesitation. Two thumbs up!

I was very surprised at how fast I sped through this book; two days! The page-turning events kept my heart pounding and my palms sweaty the entire time. The Captive Maiden is a fairy-tale retelling (one of my favorite genres to read! One many of you may have read/seen the movie of is a favorite of mine – Ella Enchanted), and this particular re-telling is a classic version of the one of the most known tales, “Cinderella.”

At first, the story really reminded me page after page of one of my favorite movies of all time, Ever After. I had no problem with this – I love, love, love that movie and while The Captive Maiden wasn’t a modern spin by itself of Cinderella, it wasn’t completely like every Cinderella version – book or movie – I’ve ever known. Last summer, I read The Fairest Maiden and The Healer’s Apprentice, also by Melanie Dickerson. I loved both of them, so when I began this one, I expected it to be very similar to the other books. And, to my pleasure, it was!

I really love these books because in Melanie Dickerson’s amazingly talented way, she manages to turn these classic fairy-tales into a creative spin all on her own, yet still very much corresponding to the original story. In this version, “Cinderella” is named Gisela, and her Prince Charming is actually the brother of the last Prince in The Fairest Maiden, Valten Gerstenberg. Of course you all know the basis of the story line – princess is living with her horrible stepmother and stepsisters who treat her as a servant and the girl dreams of a true love and escape from the life she’s lived with since her father’s death as a little girl.

In Melanie Dickerson’s telling, Gisela escapes to the tournament where Valten is participating, and when he wins the tournament he chooses her as the Queen of Beauty and Love! But Valten’s enemy Ruexner is out to get him… and his queen of beauty and love. The two get captured by the scoundrel and it’s up to Valten to save his beautiful princess.

I was pleasantly surprised at how it ended; I was enchanted with all of the characters the entire duration of the book and Melanie is a fabulously talented author in how she writes her main characters and creates heart-pounding scenes for readers to enjoy. I absolutely loved it! Definitely go and read this! 🙂

I have to tell you, I’ve been trying to finish this book for a year or two now! (I know, after my review on The View from Saturday you probably think I put books off all the time…) but the book was good. I had to sort of push myself to finally finish this particular one, though, because the problems the characters faced were so point blank. There wasn’t as much character development as I would have liked, and the main problems in the book, as I said before, were very out there; throughout the book I felt like the author didn’t even try to make the reading process in and of itself suspenseful – more of “this is the character’s problem and this is how they solve it.”

Each chapter was a character’s perspective – there’s Aggie, Kirby, Loretta, and Willow – and how they face their fears and meet one another at the Sleepy Time Motel. Aggie is putting on a brave face when she’s forced to sell the motel, Kirby is being defiant because he’s stuck at the motel with his mother while their car is being fixed; then he has to go to a military school, Loretta is happy to be visiting the Smoky Mountains where her birth mom visited at one point, along with her adopted parents, and Willow is trying to embrace the changes in her life – her mother leaving her, and her father up and selling their house to buy a stinky old motel.

While I did thoroughly enjoy the book, I felt it was too short and fast-paced. Albeit it is completely written for younger readers, the author still could have done a better job. I would have loved to have gotten to know Aggie, Kirby, Loretta, and Willow better, and may have finished this one a few years ago when I first picked it up had it been more page-turning.

This was, however, a heartwarming tale that made me smile; in the end all of the characters got what they wanted or aimed for, and that makes the reader happy. Still, the point in telling a story is telling the journey the main character takes to get where they want to be, and the telling of the journey wasn’t over-the-top, nor thrilling or very exciting to me. A good book, even though in my opinion, it could be great.

But who knows? It could be for you. Go and read the book for yourself 😉