60. Winter's Child by Cameron Dokey

Winter's Child by Cameron Dokey (Canada) - (US)
Once Upon a Time series

Pages: 175
Ages: 12+
Finished: Mar. 4, 2011
First Published: Sept. 8, 2009
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Genre: YA, Fantasy, Fairy Tale Retelling
Rating: 4/5




First sentence:

Many years ago, when the world was much younger than it is today, a king and queen dwelt together in a castle made of ice and snow.

Acquired: Received a review copy from Simon & Schuster Canada.

Reason for Reading: I've wanted to read this series for ages and have just never got around to it. Finally, I brought this book out from my backlog and read my first book in the series!

I just absolutely adored this book! When I went to get my picture for my blog post I noticed that it didn't have a very high overall rating and looked at the ratings chart to see that the opinions were all over the place on this one, from horrible to terrific. Now I don't read other reviews before I've written my own but I'm going to guess the diverse opinions on this book are due to the ending. Personally, I liked the ending. I had expected it to happen, there were clues that hinted at this happening earlier in the book and I wasn't surprised. The author could have perhaps developed this extra character, or his relationship, a bit better, so that the ending scene isn't quite so shocking to the characters in the story but it really came as no shock to this reader.

Dokey has managed to keep a fairy tale quality to her story while at the same time creating two teen characters who don't feel any less modern for it. There are no cars in this world, Grace cannot wear pants, Kai is a watchmaker apprentice while Grace does fancy embroidery; all in keeping with some medieval fairy tale world. Ye the teens speak and act quite naturally as modern teens would, with an easy report between each other and natural modern day language but it does not feel out of place at all. Dokey has created her world well.

This retelling of The Snow Queen is much different from the original yet Dokey manages to keep many key ingredients present while turning the story away from Andersen's original dark tale into a true romance story. The Snow Queen is a good guy this time, being a young cursed 16 year old girl called The Winter Child. Kai is the one who follows after her and elements such as the broken mirror and Grace's visit with the old lady who tries to keep her forever and the thief girl are included. The story is told in alternating voices, mostly of Grace and the Winter Child, though Kai speaks up as well. I always enjoy books told from various points of view but did find Kai's chapters to be the weakest. The fairy tale atmosphere is kept alive throughout the story and I think that may be what some readers will find hard to believe when it comes to the ending. I think the ending was great, and expected but others may find it too sudden. However, it is a fairy tale after all, where anything may happen.