Tag Archives: Cinderella

Booked

Cindy Ella (Robin Palmer)

Rating: [rate 4.5]

Cindy Ella (Robin Palmer)Prom fever has infected LA—especially Cindy’s two annoying stepsisters, and her overly Botoxed stepmother. Cindy seems to be the only one immune to it all. But her anti-prom letter in the school newspaper does more to turn Cindy into Queen of the Freaks than close the gap between the popular kids and the rest of the students. Everyone thinks she’s committed social suicide, except for her two best friends, the yoga goddess India and John Hughes-worshipping Malcolm, and shockingly, the most popular senior at Castle Heights High and Cindy’s crush, Adam Silver. Suddenly Cindy starts to think that maybe her social life could have a happily ever after. But there’s still the rest of the school to deal with. With a little bit of help from an unexpected source and a fabulous pair of heels, Cindy realizes that she still has a chance at a happily ever after.

I love retellings. Ever since I read about this NaNoWriMo story about putting characters from Greek mythology into one story, I’ve always wanted to write my own retelling of something. I like to see how authors make an old story into something entirely new, but still sticking to the original story.

Cindy Ella is one of those books. I already liked Robin Palmer’s Geek Charming, and I was thrilled when I found Cindy Ella in National Bookstore. It’s obviously a re-telling of Cinderella, set in Castle Heights High, the same setting as in Geek Charming.

Here we draw the similarities with the original fairy tale:

  • Cindy Ella – Cinderella, obviously
  • Clarissa – her stepmother
  • Ashley and Britney – her stepsisters
  • Adam Silver – prince charming
  • Noah and Craig – Cindy’s fairy godmothers
  • Prom – the ball

The only people I can’t put into the original story are India and Malcolm, Cindy’s friends, and her dad.

But who cares, really? Cindy Ella is such a fun book that sometimes you forget that it’s based on the fairy tale. There are a ton of laugh out loud moments, especially with Malcolm and his gay antics, as well as some more “I crush on this guy but he turned out to be gay” quotes. The ending brings us right back to the original fairy tale, which felt a bit anticlimactic for me, but it’s still good with just the right amount of tingles. :)

It’s cute, fun and definitely enchanting. :) I definitely have Robin Palmer in my favorite authors list now. :)