Review: Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross

Title: Kill Me Softly
Author: Sarah Cross
Publisher: EgmontUSA
Age Group: Young Adult
Category:  Fairy tale retelling / Romance
Release date: April 10th, 2012
Pages: 314 (e-galley)
Rating: 5 out of 5
Source: Netgalley

Mirabelle's past is shrouded in secrecy, from her parents' tragic deaths to her guardians' half-truths about why she can't return to her birthplace, Beau Rivage. Desperate to see the town, Mira runs away a week before her sixteenth birthday—and discovers a world she never could have imagined.

In Beau Rivage, nothing is what it seems—the strangely pale girl with a morbid interest in apples, the obnoxious playboy who's a beast to everyone he meets, and the chivalrous guy who has a thing for damsels in distress. Here, fairy tales come to life, curses are awakened, and ancient stories are played out again and again.

But fairy tales aren't pretty things, and they don't always end in happily ever after. Mira has a role to play, a fairy tale destiny to embrace or resist. As she struggles to take control of her fate, Mira is drawn into the lives of two brothers with fairy tale curses of their own . . . brothers who share a dark secret. And she'll find that love, just like fairy tales, can have sharp edges and hidden thorns.

Like most, I was intrigued by the cover of this book, but Kill Me Softly turned out to be so much more than a beautiful exterior.  The story begins with an introduction of nearly-sixteen-year-old Mira and her two godmothers.  Although the stories of how they became a family have remained consistent, Mira doesn't quite believe that her godmothers have told her everything.  Well, as it turns out, Mira is kept sheltered from her past life for a reason.  The only thing that she does know is that she wants to find her parents graves for her birthday, so she makes a plan and sets out for the town she was born in.  Once she arrives, the people and information she happens to stumble across end up turning her life upside down.

I quite enjoyed Mira.  She was realistic and as confused as anyone would be stepping into a town like Beau Rivage.  She wasn't unnecessarily naive and she knew how to handle herself, even if she needed the help of a few people here and there.  When she comes across a seemingly rude boy named Blue, she feels very unwelcome, but if it weren't for him, who knows where she would end up in the story.  He may have been my favorite character of them all, in fact.  He was the most honest and caring, even if he didn't always show it.  By the end of the book, he will win your heart, too.

The plot was the most interesting and I loved the inclusion of fairy tale characters such as Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Prince Charming and a handful of others- even a couple villains.  This retelling stayed true to the original stories but held such a twist within its own pages that will leave you hoping that the story goes on and on, even once it ends.  I had so much fun trying to guess which fairy tale each character was supposed to portray, as well.

There are times when an author makes the ending painfully obvious, but that's not the case here.  I was shocked more than once as I read, which was refreshing and made the book one of my new favorites.  Mira went to the town for closure but ended up with so much more than she ever could have imagined, maybe she even fell in love once or twice.  If you're fond of dark fairy tales, a bit of mystery, drama, and a mostly-happy ending, I encourage you to give this book a try.