My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending (My Very Unfairy Tale Life)

by Anna Staniszewski

[KitsuneBae]

This review was first posted at Thoughts and Pens.

Whew! Finally! My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending is the third and last installment of the My Very Unfairy Tale Life series which means another sad goodbye again. The series may not be perfect but I enjoyed it…a lot. The main problem with this series is the fact that each book is very short so I practically finished all three books in one day while waiting for Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda to landfall. Yeah, whenever I’m extremely stressed about something, I usually cope up through reading or whatever activity that takes my mind to somewhere else. So while my mother and relatives are busy praying for Yolanda to vanish or to be merciful at least, I was also busy reading the My Very Unfairy Tale Life Series.

My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending immediately picked up where it left off in the second book. But this time, Jennifer must go to Fairyland not only to save her missing parents but the Land of Tales as well. Armed only with her cheesy but funny sayings, Jennifer, Anthony and Dr. Bradley hurry to Fairyland to hamper the plans of the mad, Cinderella-wannabe Fairy Queen.

Similar to the previous two books, My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending had me laughing. Jenny never lost her spunk although she’s gotten more serious as compared with the previous two books. In this third book, she becomes more mature and in authority. Sighs, sometimes I hate my favourite characters growing up.

Being in a new land, Jenny and the gang have to deal with a fresh bunch of characters including leprechauns, alien-like fairies, Cyclops-looking trolls and golden rats. The new characters were really quirky but I was kind of frustrated since they weren’t fully fleshed out. Even the villain’s potential got wasted. And it was such a shame because she’s the evil version of Cinderella. Imagine that? It’s a treat for all of us fairy tale fans but sadly Anna didn’t take the necessary time to explore how bad can Cinderella go.

My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending’s narrative was sort of meh. I don’t know but I usually have high standards for last books because ahm… well, I believe in the adage that says “save the best for last.” Whenever I am reading a last book, my mind and heart automatically program themselves into the highest setting possible. They will automatically expect for their owner to be gutted and mindblown. Apparently, My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending did neither of those. If truth be told, the plot was horribly predictable. It’s okay if it happened once (i.e. with book 2) but if it happens with the icing of the cake, it’s not cool anymore. Even the supposedlu epic battle between the Fairy Queen and the revolutionaries was sort of pathetic. It doesn’t have the force that I’ve anticipated. What I’m only thankful is that the plot maintained its consistency and never veered off from the path.

The world building was the same with the two books. I really thought that Ana would give WB department a massive overhaul on this last sequel but…sighs. Fairyland was once a theme park and converted to a kingdom. While that was cool and all, I was still unhappy to find myself on Earth despite my efforts to be transported. As a matter of fact, I had more fun imagining Disneyland and HP Theme Park rather than Fairy land.

In a nutshell, My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending was a fun read. However, it really could have done a better job with the plot, characters and world building. Anna has already set the stage but she keeps on postponing the ceremony never taking the time to push the limits. The humor was already in place, the MC perfect but the flaws that I’ve mentioned sucked all the firepower to blast me into outer space.

Note: I received a free ARC from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.