I was so excited to dive into this world because I heard it had some LGBTQ+ representation, amazing imagery, and just a plain good story!
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Now this story follows Mina and Lynet- stepmother and stepdaughter. It is a Snow White retelling, so I was expecting the stereotypical evil stepmother idea, which is not the case at all.
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I really loved how Bashardoust made Mina and Lynet's relationship a strong and beautiful one (I mean of course it had some bad moments because of miscommunication and fear). You see so many stepmother/daughter relationships in the media be cruel and harsh when in reality that isn't always the case. That trope is also really tiring for me, and I'm so happy that route wasn't taken. There also is hardly any YA books that show a step-anything relationship between characters, and as someone who has no step in their family, it's interesting to read about it.
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Mina was probably my favorite part of this book. From her horrifying backstory to her abilities and steps to becoming queen- it was perfect. I especially loved her abilities because it was just so intricate and intriguing throughout the entire story. The character modeled after the original story's Mirror (who also was the Huntsman!) gave me goose bumps because it added such a depth to the story I wasn't expecting. Mina's internal struggles and fears were something that felt so realistic and true. She didn't become who she is because she's a malicious person (which she isn't anyway) but because of her disgusting father. I love characters with depth and many different layers, and Mina is the perfect example.
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The imagery and descriptions were PERFECT! I just have a thing for good details and imagery in stories, so reading this authors use of it was perfect.
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Now probably my only issue was that sometimes the writing seemed very childish, and Lynet was not my favorite character. She is in the beginning of the book shown as a very childish, overly sheltered young adult, but there was many instances were she kinda just.. annoyed me. It wasn't often, but it was enough to decrease my rating to a four. The story just sometimes felt like a MG in her point of view. Also I wish the lesbian representation took more of a forefront than it did because it wasn't actually shown until maybe the last 30 pages.
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Anyway, I adored this story! I recommend it to you guys especially because of Mina and the relationships/ intricacies of the characters.
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ARC provided by Flat Iron books. Thoughts and opinions are my own.