There is SO MUCH GOOD in this book. This review will probably just be a jumble of praise because I can't even begin to talk about how happy this book made me. Before I get into it, I just wanted to thank Sarah Megibow from KT Literary for sending me a copy of this book! It was my first ever book giveaway win and I was SO EXCITED. THANK YOU, SARAH!!! I can't remember the last time I had this much FUN reading a book. It's an all-around fun time: the author is frickin' HILARIOUS, the characters are amazing, it has great representation and it sends some really important messages that were just amazing to read about.

First of all, the book is a treasure trove of my ALL TIME FAVORITE BOOK TROPES. We've got PINING! We've got ENEMIES TO LOVERS! We've got FAKE (FRIENDSHIP?) DATING! WE'VE GOT ROYALTY! SO MANY GREAT THINGS. I read the first half of this book at my work and it was embarrassing to read because I could not stop smiling and cackling like an idiot. I knew not even halfway through that this would be a five star read and I'm really happy I was right.

I loved the characters! Alex was SO funny and sweet and I really liked Henry. June was awesome and a lot of the adults were great too. The plot moves pretty smoothly throughout the book, though the second half definitely transitions into more rom than com, but I was still really enjoyed those parts. The ending was super, super cute and meaningful and inspirational and it was great to escape from the shitstorm that is our current society.

TLDR; my message is to READ THIS BOOK IMMEDIATELY. PREORDER IT. IT COMES OUT ON MAY 14TH AND YOU SHOULD ALL BUY IT AND LOVE IT AND CHERISH IT. Thank u and goodnight.

OH GEEZ. My rating for this book fluctuated a lot. When I began, I was annoyed with the nonexistent indication of changing perspectives, but soon I got a handle on it and it didn't bother me as much. The beginning was a tad slow for me, and it wasn't until about 30% and then I was like YES. But theeeen, I hit the 60% mark and it got slow again. AND THEN, the ending picked up but I was at 98% and I was like... what the fresh f*** this is SO DUMB I DON'T DESERVE FOR IT TO END LIKE THIS and I was preparing myself to end this book PISSED AND THEEEEEEEEN, with three pages left, I WAS SHOOK. CRYING (as much as I could comfortably cry while at work in front of other people without looking like an insane person). And so since it ended on such a great note, I bumped up what was probably a 3.5 star read to 4.

I think my expectations for this book might've been too high after knowing what Novik was capable of with Uprooted. That book is one of my all-time favorites, so I think I was hoping that Spinning Silver would capture the same magic, but it fell a little flat. The changing perspectives was a bit much at times. I could've done without a lot of Stepon or Magreta's sections because I felt like I was skimming a lot of their stuff. I did enjoy the couple times we got a Mirnatius section though! He was a hoot, though at times a really shitty hoot. The plot was really interesting and I loved the new twists Novik brought to the Rumpelstiltskin story. And despite my criticism of many POVs, I did enjoy the main characters. Miryem and Irina were fabulous. I loved them both a lot, as well as their respective partners.

SPEAKING OF THEIR RESPECTIVE PARTNERS, oh my god I was conflicted about the romances in this book. At first I was like... is this gonna happen?? And then I was hyped because I SO WANTED IT TO HAPPEN and then both the Staryk king and Mirnatius were doing shitty things and I was like uhhhhh... do I still want this? I can't go into all my thoughts without being spoiler-y but I did really like the different dynamics of both their relationships and I'm content with Irina's end and FRICKIN' HAPPY about Miryem's. :) In the end, no- this wasn't as good as Uprooted, but it was still an enjoyable and unique fairytale retelling. Glad I can finally check this off my list!

*Thanks to Kathy for providing me with the ebook copy! All opinions are my own*
Given the fact that I was very, very misled by the synopsis, I still ended up liking this book! When I read the blurb, I was very interested. A wicked prince???? I got immediate Cruel Prince vibes and I was like ENEMIES TO LOVERS ENEMIES TO LOVERS!!! But alas, no it was definitely not enemies to lovers. While reading this, I felt a lot of similarities to Red Queen, which made me a bit nervous at first because I ended up hating the Red Queen series and I really did not want a repeat performance.

I honestly can't really explain my feelings about this book. I was hooked near the beginning, but it definitely started to slow down towards the middle and it was a bit of a struggle to get motivation to keep reading, especially with three other library holds breathing down my neck. The last 20 percent was really entertaining though, and had a few twists I was shocked by. It's weird that I'm rating this three stars when I actually... didn't really care about any of the characters? Meadow was a fine narrator but I wasn't invested in her motivation for revenge and I was disappointed when the reveal about the truth about her mother's sickness happened. Since I was anticipating a royal enemies to lovers scenario, I was definitely let down by the actual romance. Plus, I'm not a fan of the "nice boy" romance anyway and Vogel annoyed me for most of the first half. I did end up really liking Kalliope and her relationship with Meadow, though! And the ending is great!

So I ended up being a bit disappointed with this, but I still think it's a nice setup for a cool fantasy trilogy. I have absolutely no idea where the next book is gonna pick up from or what's gonna happen, especially after that ending, but I am interested. If you're a fan of Red Queen, I think you'd enjoy this!