The Evil Queen (The Forest of Good and Evil, #1)

by Gena Showalter

From the New York Times bestselling author of the Everlife trilogy, the White Rabbit Chronicles and the Lords of the Underworld series comes a fantastical and dark new fairy-tale fantasy series featuring the least likely of heroes... Welcome to the Forest of Good and Evil. Choose your side wisely.

Evil isn't born, it's made. One thought and action at a time. Take a good look at what you've made.
Far, far away, in the realm of Enchantia, creatures of legend still exist, magic is the norm and fairy tales are real. Except fairy tales aren't based on myths and legends of the past—they are prophecies of the future. Though Princess Everly Morrow was raised in the mortal human realm, she knows she's destined to rule a kingdom in Enchantia, thus fulfilling a beloved fairy tale. But which one?
At seventeen, when an ability to commune with mirrors manifests, she begins to suspect the truth, and it's more sinister than anyone ever realized.
She is destined to be Snow White's greatest enemy, the Evil Queen.
With powers beyond her imagination or control—and determined to prove herself good—Everly returns to the land of her birth, smack dab in the middle of the creepiest forest of all time. There, Everly meets Roth Charmaine, the supposed Prince Charming. Their attraction is undeniable, but their relationship is doomed. As bits and pieces of the prophecy unfold, Everly faces one betrayal after the other, and giving in to her dark side proves more tempting every day. Soon, she will have to choose. Be a hero and walk away, or become the queen—and villain—of her dreams.
The battle between good and evil is on.

• ISBN13: 9781335050229
• Publish Date: 20 August 2020 (first published 5 March 2019)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Inkyard Press
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 552
• Language: English
• URL: http://harpercollins.co.uk

Reviews

[alindstadtcorbeax]

Star Rating: —> 4.5 Stars rounded v

I actually LOVED this! There is a bit of insta-love which is a trope that I usually hateeeee, but this book is all about “sealed” fate and such, so... it made sense! It is about a land where fairy tales are not stories of the past, but actually prophecies of the future, in a high fantasy world called Enchantia. There, magic flows through the land, and all SORTS of (awesome!!!) magical races & creatures exist. The main character, Everly, arrives in Enchantia somewhat accidentally, & realizes that she is a part of the prophecy that Enchantia is trying to piece together to defeat the Evil Queen. This book is SO fun because as the story continues, both you AND the characters will be scrambling to figure out who is who in the prophecy of the Brothers Grimm story of Snow White.

The story is FULL of magic, wonder, & excitement and I really, really enjoyed it! I love retellings,
And this one was SO unique! I adored it

[blackbibliophile]

Ugh, the synopsis gave me high hopes and after reading Stepsister I was in the mood for another great retelling. This totally missed the mark for me and I literally forced myself to finish. Maybe this is more Middle Grade than YA?

On to the next one....

[tweetybugshouse]

The books was rough to get through. I think my main issue is the concept of a fairytale being a prophecy left a lot of the plot to guess work. It very choppy and overdone for a 500 page novel. Also though it a ya book the characters are to be in their upper teens and the love interest parts seem over done. I checked this book out from the library multiple times cause I started it and then get distracted and move on. I won’t read the next in the series it just was not that great. For 500 pages it should be epic and this just was not.

DNF.

[Witty and Sarcastic Bookclub]

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with this book, in exchange for my honest opinion. It will be available to purchase on June 25th.

This is going to be one of those blog posts that is a mixed bag. The premise was original, in that it’s Snow White’s nemesis that’s a bit reluctant to take up her expected role as as the villain. I also haven’t read many fairy tale adaptations that take place in both “the real world” (I write that in quotes because the way the real world was written felt off to me), and the fairy tale world.

The premise is what worked for me. The rest…not so much. The characters felt very one-dimensional to me, like they were archtypes of a CW show. There was the snotty ex, the prom queen, the popular good girl that everyone likes, and the misunderstood outcast. I found it very difficult to care about any of the characters at all.

The writing didn’t work for me. I’m just too enamored by words. So, when something unexpected happened to the main character (Everly), and the book just said, “reeling” in italics, it really irritated me. I would have preferred something along the lines of, “the news sent me reeling,” just as an example. A full thought, as opposed to a quick word, would have worked much better for me.
The dialogue felt very over the top and unbelievable to me, and the very long random explanations given throughout the first bit of the book caused the story to seem very stop-and-go. I never ended up invested in the story.

Ultimately, while it had potential, this book simply did not deliver. However, I could be just too much of a grammar nerd to appreciate the dialogue and writing style. While this book wasn’t for me, this is just one person’s opinion. I believe that Showalter is very popular author, but this book just wasn’t my thing.