The Wickeds by Gayle Foreman
Series: Faraway #5
Genre: Fantasy, Retelling, Young Adult
Pages: 35
Published By: Amazon Original Stories on 15th November, 2022
Format: Ebook
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Book Synopsis:
Envious queen? Evil stepmother? Kidnapping hag? Elsinora, Gwendolyn, and Marguerite are through with warts-and-all tabloids, ugly lies, and the three ungrateful brats who pitted them against each other and the world. But maybe thereโs more to the stories than even the Wickeds know. Is it time to finally get revenge? After all, theyโre due for a happily-enough-ever-after. Even if they have to write it themselves.
Book Review
As part of my “Amazon Originals” Summer Project, I am reading through short stories published by Amazon. ย A spin wheel picked them at random, and I ended up with getting the fifth book in the ‘Faraway’ series. I hadnโt heard of this author before, so I was intrigued to find out what I would think of their writingโฆ Because I have Amazon Prime, the eBook was included, so I didn’t have to pay for it either.
I am a huge fan of retellings so was very excited to read this. However, it had so much promise but fell so flat. With a title like The Wickeds, I expected the villains to be, well, more wicked. I know this is a young adult book but I personally think it could’ve gone a tad more darker. It was a little dark already with mentions of attempted r***e, alcoholism, addiction and other things. Keep those things in mind and treat them as trigger warnings.
The pacing of the story is quick, short and it had promise. However, the ending was a little too abrupt for me. It felt a rushed and I personally didn’t like the narrative perspective. The author keeps the narrator’s identity a mystery until the end, but even then, I couldn’t make sense of why it was that person. Once the author revealed the narrator, they switched the point of view between first and third person, which only added to the confusion.
It was fun to read a modern feeling story from an antagonist’s POV which makes the reader change the perspectives they have of them. However, I think the author could have executed it better. Plus, I found it hard to keep track of who was who at times because the author gave the Wickeds their own names.
I had an enjoyable time but I think with a little tweaking and editing, this could’ve been so much better. If you’re a fan of retellings then maybe give it ago but don’t expect anything amazing. It’s an average, good time. I don’t think I’ll be rushing to read another book from Gayle Forman any time soon…
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