Fairest of All
Fairest of All (Villains #1)
By: Serena Valentino
[Fulfilled ‘A book told from the villain’s POV’ prompt as part of Shelf Reflection’s 2024 Reading Challenge]
I pretty much just read this because it fit what I needed for my reading challenge— it’s not one that would normally draw my attention.
It’s a book written for teens and it definitely reads as such. Even the size of the book lends to that audience. It’s a smaller, square-ish book and is easily read in a day or two.
There’s nothing too complicated about the book, it’s a pretty straightforward ‘origin story’ for Snow White’s evil stepmother— how did she become so evil that she would try to kill the daughter of her beloved late husband?
Since the book is so short, there’s really not a lot of space to go into deep character development or to dredge up all the mysteries of the Queen’s childhood.
If you are a Disney fanatic, then you’ll probably enjoy this book and spending time in Snow White’s story.
I like watching Disney movies, but the Disney princesses aren’t really something I get excited about. I was interested to see how Valentino would shape the origins of the evil Queen and I think she did a decent job.
But overall the book was pretty mediocre for my tastes. The last part of the book is basically a description of the well-known Snow White story/movie so this book is not a complete original story.
The theme of the book comes as no surprise— beauty and vanity. I was hoping for some creativity but Valentino went with the obvious. It’s the concept of the story, but it just feels a bit shallow and uninteresting to me.
I agree with some other reviewers that only calling her the Queen and not using her given name doesn’t help to humanize her, which I believe all villain origin stories attempt to do. Which is also why I’m not a big fan of them. There’s never an excuse to be evil and any attempt to justify evil is a big pass for me. Sure, we can be sympathetic to their tragic childhoods and lament that they weren’t loved like they should have been, but there’s a thing called resilience and turning evil is not the only path. I prefer hero stories and those who rise above their circumstances to help others, not hurt others, so sue me.
Awhile back I had started the Once Upon a Time TV show (still haven’t finished it yet) and I did enjoy how they brought the fairy tales to life and gave some backstories to the characters and connected them all together. Obviously they had more to work with then a couple hundred page young adult book, but for me, I’d rather watch that then read this entire series.
This is Valentino’s first book and the first in a series of (currently) 12 books, each with a different Disney villain.
I think this would probably be a great series for a teenager to read. If it weren’t for the dark magic and the bloody heart I would say the audience for this book could even be younger than teens because of the writing.
Either way, I’m not sure there will be very many adults who desire to spend their time on it.
[Content Advisory: No swearing or sexual content; does have dark magic]
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