Confessions of An Ugly Stepsister (Maguire, Gregory)

by Gregory Maguire

Gregory Maguire's chilling, wonderful retelling of Cinderella is a study in contrasts. Love and hate, beauty and ugliness, cruelty and charity--each idea is stripped of its ethical trappings, smashed up against its opposite number, and laid bare for our examination. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister begins in 17th-century Holland, where the two Fisher sisters and their mother have... (read more)

Top tags: fantasyfictionfairy talesfairy talecinderella (all tags)

Readers

Groups

  • Favorite Fantasy Discussion Group
  • Crossgenre Discussion Group
  • FrugalReader.com Members Discussion Group
  • Brilliant Babes (And Dudes) Who Read Selectively Discussion Group
  • Fairy Tales Discussion Group
  • The 400 Pages (or Less) Book Club Discussion Group

Other Reviews

Amazon Reviews (5)
 

Most Helpful Reviews

Liked It

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
Ma Titwonky
  • Rated 4 stars

After reading, and thoroughly disliking Wicked by this author, I was prepared not to like Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister since the author uses the same style of fairy tale re-interpretation that he used in Wicked. I also needed to read something for PBT, and this was on my TBR shelf.

To my amazement, I really liked COAUS. What I felt did not work at all in Wicked was done much, much better in the retelling of the Cinderella story.

I...

Ma Titwonky’s full review »
more reviews »

Didn’t Like It

Barb N
  • Rated 2 stars

The second half is better, if you can stick with it.

Barb N’s full review »
more reviews »
Community:
  • Rated 3.580379 stars
Amazon:
  • Rated 4 stars
 

Newest Comments

  • Mary T

    mary t said:

    I really like the concepts of his books. I find the new twists on the classic stories to be an excellent idea.

    Unfortunately, I find his writing style to be a bit heavy-handed and tedious. I desperately WANT to like his work, but after reading Wicked, Mirror, and Tale of an Ugly Stepsister, I think I'm just going to have to concede that his writing style just isn't for me.

    posted Friday, May 16 2008
  • Krista R

    krista r said:

    Possibly my favorite of Maguire's books.

    posted Friday, May 16 2008
  • Tjones

    tjones said:

    I really enjoy what this author does to the stories on which we grew up! The author makes them enjoyable for us in our "mature" years! This version of Cinderella is great! I plan on sharing with my Disney fan family members!

    posted Wednesday, December 26 2007
© 2008 Tastemakers, Inc. | Portions of Shelfari.com are Copyright © 1996-2008 Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. Terms & Conditions | Privacy Policy | Copyright Policy