Fairest - Gail Carson Levine
by Zia ~ January 25th, 2007. Filed under: Books.
Aza is 15 and tremendously ugly. But her voice–in a magical kingdom where song is the most important thing of all–soars above the rest. When she is taken to court, she discovers that the new queen has the voice of a toad. On discovering that Aza can throw her voice too, the queen blackmails her into an arrangement whereby Aza sings for her, tricking her people. But the queen also has some darker, more sinister powers–including a mirror that has made her beautiful. How can Aza resist the temptation of being made beautiful–especially with a growing friendship with the prince? This was a nice refreshing tale in which our heroine discovers that beauty is not all.
January 25th, 2007 at 8:30 pm
She wrote Ella Enchanted, didn’t she? I really enjoyed that book.
January 26th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
Hey Helen,
I haven’t read Ella Enchanted, though I’ve heard of it. I didn’t know it was Levine, though, so I’ll definitely check it out. Thanks for the tip!
January 31st, 2007 at 1:21 pm
I’ve just noticed they have made a film out of Ella Enchanted, although that gives me a sinking feeling. Why is the film never as good as the book?
I used to live near a brilliant charity shop that had an enormous section (in fact an entire level) devoted to books. Someone in the area must have had similar reading tastes to me because I’d always leave the shop with a big haul of books. Ella Enchanted was one of my finds there. We went back to that shop a few months ago but whoever was running it had hiked up the book prices, which was a bit disappointing, but all for a good cause, I suppose. And I still, ahem, didn’t leave empty-handed!