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Spinning Thorns
Sleeping Beauty has woken.The world has been renewed.Everyone is living happily ever after . . .Almost.Sharp, blood-seeking thorns still surround the castle. A feud remains between those who wield magic and those who were subjected to it. And while the kingdom is divided against itself, nothing can thrive.A rebellion may be needed - and that's where Sleeping Beauty's daughter comes in . . .
364 pages, Kindle Edition
First published December 10, 2015
5 people are currently reading
1360 people want to read
About the author
Anna Sheehan
8 books294 followersTo tell of myself:
As Walt Whitman said, "I am large, I contain multitudes!" The epigraph of every writer, really.
I was conceived in northern Alaska, and was born to a bohemian veterinarian mother in a hospital on the shores of Lake Michigan. I endured numerous hellish years of school, and I can say with reasonable veracity that I have forgiven all my teachers and even the poor children who had to figure out how to deal with me.
Instead of a social life, I swam in books. I became a devoted follower of Diana Wynne Jones and Douglas Adams. I studied acting and Shakespeare with the Young Shakespeare Players of Madison, Wisconsin, and it deeply impacted my direction in life. I then discovered historical re-enactment, where I hung about in velvet, idly strumming a harp while men in plastic armor hit each other with sticks. That too was most enlightening.
Despite collecting a technical degree in commercial goldsmithing, I instead pursued writing as my primary means of unemployment. I moved with my family to a tiny ranch in rural Oregon, where I still live with my daughter, my mother, and assorted Irish Wolfhounds.
As Walt Whitman said, "I am large, I contain multitudes!" The epigraph of every writer, really.
I was conceived in northern Alaska, and was born to a bohemian veterinarian mother in a hospital on the shores of Lake Michigan. I endured numerous hellish years of school, and I can say with reasonable veracity that I have forgiven all my teachers and even the poor children who had to figure out how to deal with me.
Instead of a social life, I swam in books. I became a devoted follower of Diana Wynne Jones and Douglas Adams. I studied acting and Shakespeare with the Young Shakespeare Players of Madison, Wisconsin, and it deeply impacted my direction in life. I then discovered historical re-enactment, where I hung about in velvet, idly strumming a harp while men in plastic armor hit each other with sticks. That too was most enlightening.
Despite collecting a technical degree in commercial goldsmithing, I instead pursued writing as my primary means of unemployment. I moved with my family to a tiny ranch in rural Oregon, where I still live with my daughter, my mother, and assorted Irish Wolfhounds.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
March 2, 2018
I am not going to forget that I wasn't crazy about this story's beginning.
I am however going to say that it does improve in a spectacular way: the sort that leaves you wondering what is going to happen next, when you finally have to go to sleep.
Yes, I had a hard time with the beginning. I actually went back and start re-reading it once I noticed that a certain word _kit _ kept being repeated by the male character. Over and over.
I think I counted it being used thirty times in just a few pages. And I kept wondering, why not call her "sister" or "my sister"?
And the answer finally came to me towards the end due to the character's personality. So,there, a thing that I wasn't "getting" actually had a purpose that I was missing.
The other thing that I wasn't crazy about had to do with the changing pov's.
Well, not the pov's per se, but the way they were told: For the guy, we have first person, for Princess Will we have third person. I don't know if I was being picky, but the thing got annoying... until I stopped paying attention to it and I started gobbling up pages as fast as I could.
Because I honestly cannot pin down the page in which I got hooked by this story.
Once the characters started to grow on me, I probably was a goner...
Will is not your typical fairy tale princess.
She has felt inadequate her whole life by comparison with her older sister. The perfect one. The one with the classical beauty, and the petit measurements. Her relationship with her mother _ the former Sleeping Beauty _ isn't perfect, but she has her father to lean on.
She knows she's not perfect. She longs for someone she can't have, but she doesn't let that define her.
She's rational and resourceful, and she knows that in the end she will do whatever her kingdom needs: even if it means abandoning her studies on magic.
You may not like her in the beginning, but I bet that you will come to respect her in the end.
I don't want to reveal too much of the plot, or too much on the characters, because that's half the fun, so I'll just say that Will and the one that will not be named ;) are wonderful characters, and that I loved reading their story.
December 31, 2015
I was a little skeptical about this book at first. I'm not the biggest fantasy lover, and as far as I was concerned, Anna Sheehan had already written by far the best Sleeping Beauty retelling I've ever read, which was her debut novel, A Long Long Sleep. I wasn't sure how much more Sheehan could do with that fairytale--but it turns out she can do an awful lot. Spinning Thorns doesn't resemble A Long Long Sleep at all, but it's a very strong retelling nonetheless.
Unlike A Long Long Sleep, Spinning Thorns is set in a classic fairytale world. It takes place twenty years after the events of Sleeping Beauty, and it's the story of the Sleeping Beauty's daughter, Willow. With its heavy emphasis on magic and its focus on the daughter of Sleeping Beauty, Spinning Thorns looks like a mash-up between Robin McKinley's Spindle's End and Stacey Jay's Princess of Thorns. And somehow it takes the weakest elements of both of those books--the magic and the world-building, respectively--and makes them way better. While Robin McKinley's book was thick with magic to the point where it was suffocating, Spinning Thorns does a superior job of explaining the logic behind the spells and ensuring that magic (almost) never conveniently rescued the characters. (The showdown with King Lesli felt a little bit like the "Because, magic!" vibe I got off of Spindle's End, but that's a minor complaint.) And although I love Princess of Thorns, its weakest point was easily the world-building. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Anna Sheehan is a world-builder. She understands everything in this post-Sleeping Beauty world from the tension between the faeries and the humans to the politics between kingdoms to the curse on the Nameless. A Long Long Sleep talks about the psychological ramifications of a fairytale; Spinning Thorns is far more about the social and political aspects. And it's so well thought-out, from start to finish.
The two main characters are likable enough. Princess Willow, or Will, is just well-rounded enough to seem like a real person--I never felt like I understood her as much as I understood Rose Fitzroy, but she's the right mix of stubborn, irrational, girlish, and dutiful. I liked how she wasn't above fault (she makes mistakes, she daydreams about her sister's fiancé, she has a sticky relationship with her sister), but she was still an empowering protagonist who I could root for. She's politically smart, sees through other people's lies, and willing to put the needs of her family and kingdom above her own. (On a side-note, it was also nice to see a more awkward, taller, bigger princess who doesn't have a major makeover by the end of the novel.) The other protagonist, who technically doesn't have a name but is referred to as "Reynard", is a little more enigmatic and brooding. I didn't like him nearly as much because I never got a clear reading on who he was as a person (which was probably deliberate, seeing how he has a hard time figuring himself out), but he had a more rewarding ending.
On a side-note, there's a strange POV-jump between the two protagonists--while everything told from Reynard's side is in the first person, all of Will's chapters are in the third person. In Reynard's case, I understand why first person was almost a necessity (although Will calls him "Reynard", he doesn't actually have a name, so it would be annoying to constantly refer to him as the Nameless or "he"), but I don't quite get why Will couldn't have worked in the first person, too. It's not really a complaint--the writing is strong in either format--but it's an interesting choice to make.
What really impressed me in A Long Long Sleep and has continued to impress me in all of Sheehan's book is the complexity and maturity of her characters' relationships. Admittedly, the central romance wasn't all it could have been, but Will and Reynard's relationships with their families and friends were excellently drawn. Will's adoration of Prince Ferdinand was instantly relatable and believable, and the way she dealt with it was incredibly mature and made me like her all the more. Reynard's frustration with his mother and his love for his sister were equally palpable, and I loved how Will's father, King Ragi (probably my favorite supporting character), was a caring, understanding presence in her life, rather than your average fictional absentee parent. And, I think most of all, I deeply appreciated the troubled relationship between Will and her sister, Lavender. For whatever reason, most of the sister relationships I read about are either overly cutesy (they're the best of friends and confide in one another all the time) or overly bitchy (they're constantly jealous of one another, fighting over everything, making each other's lives a living hell). Will and Lavender's relationship is somewhere in between. Will resents her sister on many levels (and indeed confesses that she hates her), but at the same time, you can see that she cares about her and is willing to risk her own safety to save her. It's very subtly written--it's certainly not the driving focus of the story--but it's one of the novel's strongest points. The fact that a person can both love and hate their sibling is so unacknowledged, and I love that Sheehan put that fact out there and in such a simple, unapologetic way.
The story itself is pretty basic and straightforward--there's another curse (although it's slightly different than the original one) and Will has to find a way to save her people. It's just similar enough to Sleeping Beauty for fans of the original to be pleased, but it's got just enough twists to keep people entertained. Some key decisions include the curse affecting everybody at different rates, the hovering threat of the neighboring kingdom of Hiedelen, which wants to take over the increasingly vulnerable Lyndaria, and the integration of Reynard's story, which is both familiar (there are elements of Rumplestiltskin in there) and completely original at the same time.
Although it's one of my favorite fairytales, a lot of people pick on Sleeping Beauty for being slow and boring. And there's no getting around it: Spinning Thorns is a slow-paced book. The central conflict doesn't really emerge until a hundred pages in and after that, the characters basically walk around and watch the horrific results of the curse for another hundred pages before even trying to do anything to change it. By all means, it should be boring. There's no big "quest" to find the solution--the closest thing we get is an overnight trek through the woods to find a faerie and then the characters promptly return home. But for some reason, despite the serious lack of action or forward momentum, there is not a single boring moment in Spinning Thorns. I don't know why. Maybe it's the joy of watching the characters interact with one another. Maybe it was the awesome world-building. Maybe it's the details Sheehan has sprinkled in every single page, many of which aren't really essential to the plot, but helped me get a better grasp of the world. Maybe I just liked passing the time with Will and Reynard. I have no idea what it was, but I could not put this book down. I suppose that's just a demonstration of Sheehan's talent as an author.
I'll admit that compared to Sheehan's UniCorp books, Spinning Thorns feels a bit emotionally detached. While I liked her characters, I never really fell in love with them or sympathized with them or rooted for them (or even hated them) like I did in Sheehan's other two books. But oddly enough, it works to the book's advantage because it evokes the older fairytales, which were also a little bit aloof in their storytelling and characterization. That being said, I didn't find Reynard's decision to curse the kingdom true to his character, maybe because we barely knew him by the time he chose to do it (there is a revelation near the end where he owns up to some reasons he couldn't admit to himself before, but the abrupt action at the beginning still took me out of the story), and the love story was way too underdeveloped for me to buy it. There's so much sophistication everywhere else in the story, from family to politics to magic, that I found these aspects, which were so central to the story, lacking in comparison.
And yet, I'm almost completely willing to forgive these flaws because the utter brilliance of the final fifteen pages more than makes up for them. For the first time, I understood Reynard and how his curse held him back from truly feeling happy and being able to care for others. I understood the wonders that came with seeing the world in a new way. I loved the emphasis on happy endings, but happy endings that come with difficulty and hard work. I haven't closed a book feeling so impressed and satisfied in a very long time. (In a way, it reminded me of the chills the ending of A Long Long Sleep gave me when I read it for the first time over a year ago.) The best was saved for last in this case, because Spinning Thorns has a beautiful, sophisticated ending.
Spinning Thorns isn't quite as polished, intelligent, or emotional as A Long Long Sleep, but it's still a wonderful novel and made me fall even more in love with Anna Sheehan's writing. Her stories are original, unsettling (in a good way), thoughtful, and incredibly, achingly human. This is one of the best takes on Sleeping Beauty I've come across (ironically, it's bested by Sheehan's other retelling), and retelling aspect aside, it's just a fun, inventive story on its own. This one's a winner.
4 stars.
Unlike A Long Long Sleep, Spinning Thorns is set in a classic fairytale world. It takes place twenty years after the events of Sleeping Beauty, and it's the story of the Sleeping Beauty's daughter, Willow. With its heavy emphasis on magic and its focus on the daughter of Sleeping Beauty, Spinning Thorns looks like a mash-up between Robin McKinley's Spindle's End and Stacey Jay's Princess of Thorns. And somehow it takes the weakest elements of both of those books--the magic and the world-building, respectively--and makes them way better. While Robin McKinley's book was thick with magic to the point where it was suffocating, Spinning Thorns does a superior job of explaining the logic behind the spells and ensuring that magic (almost) never conveniently rescued the characters. (The showdown with King Lesli felt a little bit like the "Because, magic!" vibe I got off of Spindle's End, but that's a minor complaint.) And although I love Princess of Thorns, its weakest point was easily the world-building. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Anna Sheehan is a world-builder. She understands everything in this post-Sleeping Beauty world from the tension between the faeries and the humans to the politics between kingdoms to the curse on the Nameless. A Long Long Sleep talks about the psychological ramifications of a fairytale; Spinning Thorns is far more about the social and political aspects. And it's so well thought-out, from start to finish.
The two main characters are likable enough. Princess Willow, or Will, is just well-rounded enough to seem like a real person--I never felt like I understood her as much as I understood Rose Fitzroy, but she's the right mix of stubborn, irrational, girlish, and dutiful. I liked how she wasn't above fault (she makes mistakes, she daydreams about her sister's fiancé, she has a sticky relationship with her sister), but she was still an empowering protagonist who I could root for. She's politically smart, sees through other people's lies, and willing to put the needs of her family and kingdom above her own. (On a side-note, it was also nice to see a more awkward, taller, bigger princess who doesn't have a major makeover by the end of the novel.) The other protagonist, who technically doesn't have a name but is referred to as "Reynard", is a little more enigmatic and brooding. I didn't like him nearly as much because I never got a clear reading on who he was as a person (which was probably deliberate, seeing how he has a hard time figuring himself out), but he had a more rewarding ending.
On a side-note, there's a strange POV-jump between the two protagonists--while everything told from Reynard's side is in the first person, all of Will's chapters are in the third person. In Reynard's case, I understand why first person was almost a necessity (although Will calls him "Reynard", he doesn't actually have a name, so it would be annoying to constantly refer to him as the Nameless or "he"), but I don't quite get why Will couldn't have worked in the first person, too. It's not really a complaint--the writing is strong in either format--but it's an interesting choice to make.
What really impressed me in A Long Long Sleep and has continued to impress me in all of Sheehan's book is the complexity and maturity of her characters' relationships. Admittedly, the central romance wasn't all it could have been, but Will and Reynard's relationships with their families and friends were excellently drawn. Will's adoration of Prince Ferdinand was instantly relatable and believable, and the way she dealt with it was incredibly mature and made me like her all the more. Reynard's frustration with his mother and his love for his sister were equally palpable, and I loved how Will's father, King Ragi (probably my favorite supporting character), was a caring, understanding presence in her life, rather than your average fictional absentee parent. And, I think most of all, I deeply appreciated the troubled relationship between Will and her sister, Lavender. For whatever reason, most of the sister relationships I read about are either overly cutesy (they're the best of friends and confide in one another all the time) or overly bitchy (they're constantly jealous of one another, fighting over everything, making each other's lives a living hell). Will and Lavender's relationship is somewhere in between. Will resents her sister on many levels (and indeed confesses that she hates her), but at the same time, you can see that she cares about her and is willing to risk her own safety to save her. It's very subtly written--it's certainly not the driving focus of the story--but it's one of the novel's strongest points. The fact that a person can both love and hate their sibling is so unacknowledged, and I love that Sheehan put that fact out there and in such a simple, unapologetic way.
The story itself is pretty basic and straightforward--there's another curse (although it's slightly different than the original one) and Will has to find a way to save her people. It's just similar enough to Sleeping Beauty for fans of the original to be pleased, but it's got just enough twists to keep people entertained. Some key decisions include the curse affecting everybody at different rates, the hovering threat of the neighboring kingdom of Hiedelen, which wants to take over the increasingly vulnerable Lyndaria, and the integration of Reynard's story, which is both familiar (there are elements of Rumplestiltskin in there) and completely original at the same time.
Although it's one of my favorite fairytales, a lot of people pick on Sleeping Beauty for being slow and boring. And there's no getting around it: Spinning Thorns is a slow-paced book. The central conflict doesn't really emerge until a hundred pages in and after that, the characters basically walk around and watch the horrific results of the curse for another hundred pages before even trying to do anything to change it. By all means, it should be boring. There's no big "quest" to find the solution--the closest thing we get is an overnight trek through the woods to find a faerie and then the characters promptly return home. But for some reason, despite the serious lack of action or forward momentum, there is not a single boring moment in Spinning Thorns. I don't know why. Maybe it's the joy of watching the characters interact with one another. Maybe it was the awesome world-building. Maybe it's the details Sheehan has sprinkled in every single page, many of which aren't really essential to the plot, but helped me get a better grasp of the world. Maybe I just liked passing the time with Will and Reynard. I have no idea what it was, but I could not put this book down. I suppose that's just a demonstration of Sheehan's talent as an author.
I'll admit that compared to Sheehan's UniCorp books, Spinning Thorns feels a bit emotionally detached. While I liked her characters, I never really fell in love with them or sympathized with them or rooted for them (or even hated them) like I did in Sheehan's other two books. But oddly enough, it works to the book's advantage because it evokes the older fairytales, which were also a little bit aloof in their storytelling and characterization. That being said, I didn't find Reynard's decision to curse the kingdom true to his character, maybe because we barely knew him by the time he chose to do it (there is a revelation near the end where he owns up to some reasons he couldn't admit to himself before, but the abrupt action at the beginning still took me out of the story), and the love story was way too underdeveloped for me to buy it. There's so much sophistication everywhere else in the story, from family to politics to magic, that I found these aspects, which were so central to the story, lacking in comparison.
And yet, I'm almost completely willing to forgive these flaws because the utter brilliance of the final fifteen pages more than makes up for them. For the first time, I understood Reynard and how his curse held him back from truly feeling happy and being able to care for others. I understood the wonders that came with seeing the world in a new way. I loved the emphasis on happy endings, but happy endings that come with difficulty and hard work. I haven't closed a book feeling so impressed and satisfied in a very long time. (In a way, it reminded me of the chills the ending of A Long Long Sleep gave me when I read it for the first time over a year ago.) The best was saved for last in this case, because Spinning Thorns has a beautiful, sophisticated ending.
Spinning Thorns isn't quite as polished, intelligent, or emotional as A Long Long Sleep, but it's still a wonderful novel and made me fall even more in love with Anna Sheehan's writing. Her stories are original, unsettling (in a good way), thoughtful, and incredibly, achingly human. This is one of the best takes on Sleeping Beauty I've come across (ironically, it's bested by Sheehan's other retelling), and retelling aspect aside, it's just a fun, inventive story on its own. This one's a winner.
4 stars.
October 29, 2020
یک جورهایی افسانه پریان عاشقانه بود. به همون شیرینی اما تلخی هم داشت. هرچند سیاه نبود. این بار واقعا با زیبای خفته روبرو بودیم. البته سالها بعد از بیدار شدن از نفرین خواب. داستان اگرچه به سبک افسانه پریان بود، اما در روابط انسانی انگیزه ها و شخصیت پردازی و ... نسبتا واقع گرایانه و منطقی بود. یعنی اگرچه به سبک افسانه پریان بود اما برخلاف اونها قهرمان ها، همه چیز تموم نبودند و کاملا انسانی رفتار می کردند. کشمش های احساسی ملموس بود. زاویه دید بین اول شخص (قهرمان مرد داستان) و سوم شخص (قهرمان زن داستان) عوض می شد. گیرا و روان بود، ترجمه هم مناسب بود. با کج سلیقگی نام داستان در ترجمه عوض شده بود و عنوان نه چندان جالب «جادو هرگز نمی خوابد» به جای عنوان اصلی گذاشته شده. در مجموع داستان دلچسبی بود که می تونم بگم دوست داشتم و با لذتی که آدم شیرینی خامه شکلاتی می خوره، خوندمش و کاملا غرقش شدم. نکات ظریف و قشنگی هم داشت. بعد از مدتها، داستانی تونست من رو کاملا غرق در خودش کنه که این به نظرم نشانه قدرت داستان بود. در مجموع دوستش داشتم و با لذت خوندمش. اگر به افسانه های پریان علاقه دارین این کتاب رو به شما توصیه می کنم.
Want to read
January 3, 2016Because I'm a sucker for gorgeous book covers!
August 2, 2024
این کتاب رو دیروز یه سره خوندمش، چون قراره بود امروز پسش بدم به کتابخونه-
شیرین بود، سرگرم کننده بود، جالب بود؛ ولی چطوری بگم، اون طوری که معمولا کتابهای فانتزی بهم میچسبن، نچسبید. حتی دقیق نمیدونم چرا. شاید چون یه جاهاییام حس میکردم داره زیادی همهچیز رو توجیه میکنه، حوصلهام سر میرفت و برای همین صفحههارو رد میکردم (احتمالا دلیل اینکه یک روزه تموم شد هم همینه.) یا شاید به خاطر اینکه خیلی وقته فانتزی نخوندم و زمان نیازه تا دوباره برگردم به دوران being a total simp for fantasy books.
اگه یکی درمورد یه کتاب فانتزی پیشنهاد بخواد، توصیهاش میکنم؟ آره حتما. حتی احتمالا خودمم بعدا دوباره بخونمش؛ اما برای حالا، خوشحالم که خودم این کتاب رو نخریدم.
شیرین بود، سرگرم کننده بود، جالب بود؛ ولی چطوری بگم، اون طوری که معمولا کتابهای فانتزی بهم میچسبن، نچسبید. حتی دقیق نمیدونم چرا. شاید چون یه جاهاییام حس میکردم داره زیادی همهچیز رو توجیه میکنه، حوصلهام سر میرفت و برای همین صفحههارو رد میکردم (احتمالا دلیل اینکه یک روزه تموم شد هم همینه.) یا شاید به خاطر اینکه خیلی وقته فانتزی نخوندم و زمان نیازه تا دوباره برگردم به دوران being a total simp for fantasy books.
اگه یکی درمورد یه کتاب فانتزی پیشنهاد بخواد، توصیهاش میکنم؟ آره حتما. حتی احتمالا خودمم بعدا دوباره بخونمش؛ اما برای حالا، خوشحالم که خودم این کتاب رو نخریدم.
Want to read
June 12, 2015Look at this cover. It is STUNNING!
April 18, 2021
2.5 stars
Fair is fair, although I wasn't completely in love with Sheehan's first book A Long, Long Sleep, I decided to give her another shot with Spinning Thorns. Though it's ANOTHER Sleeping Beauty retelling, that's one of my favorite fairy tales. And with this cute of a cover, I could hardly resist. But in this case... I wish I had.
Spinning Thorns puts another spin on Sleeping Beauty (see wut I did thur). In this version, our main character is one of the original Sleeping Beauty's daughters. She's awoken, but the thorns around the castle remain and the kingdom has come into political and economic turmoil after being without their monarchs for so long. The story is told from two points of view: Willow, the princess, and an Unnamed fairy, who plots for the demise of the royal family.
You'd think - hey, that sounds like a hate-to-love thing that's sure to be promising. Yes and no. As far as the romance goes, this book was rather frustrating. Willow is in love with her sister's betrothed, which is hopelessly unrequited and ridiculously intense for a relationship that amounts to one conversation between the two where he happened to be nice to her. (Seriously. And she seriously says she's in love with him because of that.) Her sister and this dude are GROSSLY in love with each other. Like serious crying "I can't live without the other" constantly touching each other and flirting and singing the other's praises and whatever... Ugh. Get a fucking room. And lock the door so I can't walk in on that anymore. So Willow and the Unnamed fairy (who she dubs Reynard because he reminds her of a fox, how creative) do start off hating each other... and eventually grow to care for each other. But it took way too long to get there for me to still care. I did not really have shippy feels.
That's also because I care so little for these characters. Like holy crap, they're not cardboard but they're not super voice-y or dynamic. Willow I should logically be cheering on because she's not a helpless, delicate princess and she actually has more of a manly, giant figure. But she's so negative about that all the time that I'm just side-eyeing her. Reynard is so wrapped up in mystery and hatred that I *should* like him, but I dunno. I probably liked his part of the story more than Willow's but I still didn't care too much for it.
Overall this story just kind of bored me. It wasn't so bad that I felt like quitting, probably because in a sense there was enough happening to keep the plot moving forward. Willow wants to learn magic, so she can also help to take care of the thorns, and Reynard kind of helps her learn about magic when it's been outlawed for so long. Then another Sleep falls upon the palace and it gets pretty chaotic. Magic becomes outlawed again, political battles are waged with betrothals, treaties, and the like, and the relationship between Willow and her family is put to the test.
So the premise, I guess, was interesting enough, but the execution never got me on the edge of my seat. I was lacking the voice to get drawn into the personal conflict and mindset of the characters. I was very much on the outside, looking in. And that's something I seem to remember having with A Long, Long Sleep as well. I liked that one more, but maybe overall Sheehan's writing style lacks something for me - depth or characterization or a general "feelsy" quality. I dunno. I feel very meh about this book.
Summing Up:
Yeah, this review is uninspired, because this book is so uninspiring. Spinning Thorns was mildly interesting, but it never really sucked me into the story. I couldn't connect to the characters, the romantic drama was exhausting, and overall I was never truly impressed. I wonder if Sheehan just may not be a good author for me. Something in her style is lacking for me.
GIF it to me straight!
Recommended To:
asdfjkl; ugh, just go read A Wicked Thing instead.
Fair is fair, although I wasn't completely in love with Sheehan's first book A Long, Long Sleep, I decided to give her another shot with Spinning Thorns. Though it's ANOTHER Sleeping Beauty retelling, that's one of my favorite fairy tales. And with this cute of a cover, I could hardly resist. But in this case... I wish I had.
Spinning Thorns puts another spin on Sleeping Beauty (see wut I did thur). In this version, our main character is one of the original Sleeping Beauty's daughters. She's awoken, but the thorns around the castle remain and the kingdom has come into political and economic turmoil after being without their monarchs for so long. The story is told from two points of view: Willow, the princess, and an Unnamed fairy, who plots for the demise of the royal family.
You'd think - hey, that sounds like a hate-to-love thing that's sure to be promising. Yes and no. As far as the romance goes, this book was rather frustrating. Willow is in love with her sister's betrothed, which is hopelessly unrequited and ridiculously intense for a relationship that amounts to one conversation between the two where he happened to be nice to her. (Seriously. And she seriously says she's in love with him because of that.) Her sister and this dude are GROSSLY in love with each other. Like serious crying "I can't live without the other" constantly touching each other and flirting and singing the other's praises and whatever... Ugh. Get a fucking room. And lock the door so I can't walk in on that anymore. So Willow and the Unnamed fairy (who she dubs Reynard because he reminds her of a fox, how creative) do start off hating each other... and eventually grow to care for each other. But it took way too long to get there for me to still care. I did not really have shippy feels.
That's also because I care so little for these characters. Like holy crap, they're not cardboard but they're not super voice-y or dynamic. Willow I should logically be cheering on because she's not a helpless, delicate princess and she actually has more of a manly, giant figure. But she's so negative about that all the time that I'm just side-eyeing her. Reynard is so wrapped up in mystery and hatred that I *should* like him, but I dunno. I probably liked his part of the story more than Willow's but I still didn't care too much for it.
Overall this story just kind of bored me. It wasn't so bad that I felt like quitting, probably because in a sense there was enough happening to keep the plot moving forward. Willow wants to learn magic, so she can also help to take care of the thorns, and Reynard kind of helps her learn about magic when it's been outlawed for so long. Then another Sleep falls upon the palace and it gets pretty chaotic. Magic becomes outlawed again, political battles are waged with betrothals, treaties, and the like, and the relationship between Willow and her family is put to the test.
So the premise, I guess, was interesting enough, but the execution never got me on the edge of my seat. I was lacking the voice to get drawn into the personal conflict and mindset of the characters. I was very much on the outside, looking in. And that's something I seem to remember having with A Long, Long Sleep as well. I liked that one more, but maybe overall Sheehan's writing style lacks something for me - depth or characterization or a general "feelsy" quality. I dunno. I feel very meh about this book.
Summing Up:
Yeah, this review is uninspired, because this book is so uninspiring. Spinning Thorns was mildly interesting, but it never really sucked me into the story. I couldn't connect to the characters, the romantic drama was exhausting, and overall I was never truly impressed. I wonder if Sheehan just may not be a good author for me. Something in her style is lacking for me.
GIF it to me straight!
Recommended To:
asdfjkl; ugh, just go read A Wicked Thing instead.
November 3, 2018
Beautiful reimagining of the tale of Rumpelstiltskin, a bit dark but the atmosphere of the book was really palpable. I love it that here, Rumpelstiltskin is dealt with as a complex many-layered character
who is just like anybody, dealing and adjusting to the hard blows dealt to him by Life (instead of just dismissing him as the bad guy in other such retellings).
The character of Will is strongly drawn and she comes out as an unusually relatable heroine full of spunk and wit. I don't have any positive comment on Ferdinand. He seems veiled and far-off from the novel.
Sparkly, imaginative and heartbreaking, this novel drew me in with an intensity I haven't encountered for long in this genre.
More on my blog: https://soothingrays.wordpress.com
who is just like anybody, dealing and adjusting to the hard blows dealt to him by Life (instead of just dismissing him as the bad guy in other such retellings).
The character of Will is strongly drawn and she comes out as an unusually relatable heroine full of spunk and wit. I don't have any positive comment on Ferdinand. He seems veiled and far-off from the novel.
Sparkly, imaginative and heartbreaking, this novel drew me in with an intensity I haven't encountered for long in this genre.
More on my blog: https://soothingrays.wordpress.com
June 18, 2017
Pardon the pun, but this story is woven together seamlessly. I love it. Anna's best novel yet!
March 14, 2016
This book is lovely. It’s private and personal and vulnerable and hopeful and everything in between. Like Sheehan's previous books, this has elements of fairy tale retelling, although this one is more fantasy world and not sci fi. Mostly, though, it’s a human story about pain and anger and revenge and forgiveness and acceptance. Instead of trying to pack as many action movie sequences on a page as possible, the author takes the time to lay in all the emotional stakes, and then lets them go off. I read (finished) 120 books in 2015, and this was one of the standouts that make me *feel.* Loved it.
June 18, 2018
This novel was extremely well written and interesting . It takes an old , overly adapted fairy tale and turns it into something exciting and unique . I am very impressed that Anna Sheehan could write two retellings of the same fairytale ( sleeping beauty) , and make them completely different but also equally fantastic . Her characters are always flawed but lovable , her world building is top notch , and she can create a sort of atmosphere in her novels that stays with you long after you read the last page .
March 19, 2016
Princess Amaranth slept for a hundred years, guarded by a giant hedge of vicious thorns, until she was awakened by a kiss. Then she married her prince and produced an heir, the perfect princess Lavender, (oh, and a not so perfect princess Willow.) The wicked fairy who cast the sleeping curse was banished and vanished, along with all her kin. There was nothing to keep Amaranth from living happily ever after.
Well, except for the personal disaster of missing a hundred years, the political mess caused when the entire royal courted checked out for a hundred years, the economic mess caused by banning any kind of spinning in the entire kingdom, and the horticultural disaster of a magical thorn hedge that refuses to go away.
And then, 20 years later, the sleep curse reappears. In fact, the perfect princess Lavender spends most of the book asleep—which is just as well. The reader would have spent the whole book asleep too, if it was about such a perfect princess.
Instead, the book is about Willow who is big and strong and looks terrible in the current fashions. She frequently ‘borrows’ her father’s clothes. Although the study of magic is frowned on, Willow believes that anyone who lives in a castle surrounded by a malevolent magic hedge ought to study the subject.
In her search for magical information, Willow encounters a strange magician. He is surly and refuses to give his name, but he helps Willow. So when the enchanted sleep strikes again, Willow turns to him. Is he the solution to the problem, perhaps the cause of the problem, or both?
Told from the alternating points of view of Willow and the unnamed magician, the novel explores revenge, rewards, the effects of just and unjust punishment, love, hatred, forgiveness of others, and forgiveness of self. Author Anna Sheehan spins a beguiling tale. She also gets her spinning details right, including a reasonable scenario in which a person could be injured by a spindle, which is not, in general, a sharp object. The characters face their trials with fortitude and ingenuity. The villain gets a well deserved come-uppance. And the ending is as happy as it can be without straining the credulity of either the reader or the heroine. I thoroughly enjoyed this twisted—or rather—well spun fairy tale.
Well, except for the personal disaster of missing a hundred years, the political mess caused when the entire royal courted checked out for a hundred years, the economic mess caused by banning any kind of spinning in the entire kingdom, and the horticultural disaster of a magical thorn hedge that refuses to go away.
And then, 20 years later, the sleep curse reappears. In fact, the perfect princess Lavender spends most of the book asleep—which is just as well. The reader would have spent the whole book asleep too, if it was about such a perfect princess.
Instead, the book is about Willow who is big and strong and looks terrible in the current fashions. She frequently ‘borrows’ her father’s clothes. Although the study of magic is frowned on, Willow believes that anyone who lives in a castle surrounded by a malevolent magic hedge ought to study the subject.
In her search for magical information, Willow encounters a strange magician. He is surly and refuses to give his name, but he helps Willow. So when the enchanted sleep strikes again, Willow turns to him. Is he the solution to the problem, perhaps the cause of the problem, or both?
Told from the alternating points of view of Willow and the unnamed magician, the novel explores revenge, rewards, the effects of just and unjust punishment, love, hatred, forgiveness of others, and forgiveness of self. Author Anna Sheehan spins a beguiling tale. She also gets her spinning details right, including a reasonable scenario in which a person could be injured by a spindle, which is not, in general, a sharp object. The characters face their trials with fortitude and ingenuity. The villain gets a well deserved come-uppance. And the ending is as happy as it can be without straining the credulity of either the reader or the heroine. I thoroughly enjoyed this twisted—or rather—well spun fairy tale.
November 14, 2016
I had a weird experience with this book, but then I read some other reviews and I saw something similar. The beginning was so slow to me and I could barely bring myself to read more than a few pages at a time. I seriously put it aside and read several other books in the meantime. Then, by the time I got to the last 150 pages or so, I was so invested, I couldn't stop reading!
I loved the characters and the romance and the blend of fairy tales by the end!
I loved the characters and the romance and the blend of fairy tales by the end!
August 22, 2022
3.5 stars
Funny that this is my third retelling or disney inspired book which I read this past week and I have to admit sleeping beauty is my least favorite
But this book was well written. The main focus was on a girl and boy and despite the fact that the boy actually was the one who messed up everything but he himslef helped the other to save everything
It was cool and refreshing at the same time a little boring but You can give it a try if you are sleeping beauty fan
Funny that this is my third retelling or disney inspired book which I read this past week and I have to admit sleeping beauty is my least favorite
But this book was well written. The main focus was on a girl and boy and despite the fact that the boy actually was the one who messed up everything but he himslef helped the other to save everything
It was cool and refreshing at the same time a little boring but You can give it a try if you are sleeping beauty fan
October 3, 2016
3.5 stars.
This needs a reread. I only appreciated the characters when I was nearing the end of the story which shouldn't have been the case. It was only because I was expecting something different that I failed to root for the characters from the beginning. Nevertheless, it was a fun read.
This needs a reread. I only appreciated the characters when I was nearing the end of the story which shouldn't have been the case. It was only because I was expecting something different that I failed to root for the characters from the beginning. Nevertheless, it was a fun read.
March 8, 2016
Surprisingly good! Some very clever plot twists, and aimed at an older readership than I anticipated with some references (not overt ones) to rape.
June 20, 2017
This book is so good. I don't know how only small amount of people has read this book. It should be given more credit than it has let on. People read this book. It's totally worth it.
October 5, 2019
رای من در اصل 4.33 هستش
شروع: متوسط رو به بالا
کشش داستان: متوسط رو به بالا
پایان بندی: خیلی خوب
قابل درک بودن اشخاص: خیلی خوب
نثر: متوسط رو به بالا
رای خودم: متوسط رو به بالا
شروع: متوسط رو به بالا
کشش داستان: متوسط رو به بالا
پایان بندی: خیلی خوب
قابل درک بودن اشخاص: خیلی خوب
نثر: متوسط رو به بالا
رای خودم: متوسط رو به بالا
August 30, 2019
There are so many things about this book I loved... and it's so badly edited I had trouble believing it wasn't self-published because I was actively noting typos and formatting errors as I read. Then there's the sheer amount of times information was repeated, or told to the reader at considerable length and then shown as well. It had a lot of good things in it and I read it only breaking to sleep overnight, but I wish it had been put through a few more rewrites, it feels more like a draft than something finished.
September 30, 2020
I'm always a little cautious with retellings because sometimes they literally are retellings without bringing anything new to the table. That isn't the case here, and Spinning Thorns was an interesting approach to classic fairy tale. I really enjoyed the writing style, but I had trouble connecting with the characters until towards the very end of the book and there was a few places, where whether because of that or pacing, my interest waned. Still, it was an enjoyable read and I would be interested in checking out the author's other Sleeping Beauty retelling.
February 21, 2022
So....I started this at like, 9 or 10pm at night and um well the next time I checked the clock, which was when I'd finished it, it was 5.30am. I mean, that kind of speaks for itself, doesn't it? I LOVED this book. I loved the characters, and the story, and the world. This fairytale mashup nextgen romance adventure thing has somehow captured my heart and the ending was so GOOD and YES. I just want to read it again, so I'm glad I still have two weeks left on my library loan.
Definitely recommend for all you young adults with a spot spot for fantasy and romance :)
Definitely recommend for all you young adults with a spot spot for fantasy and romance :)
March 3, 2025
بخاطر پایانش یک ستاره بیشتر میدم
اینکه یک فصل درمیون اول شخص یا سوم شخص میشد رو دوست نداشتم. ترجیح میدادم همش سوم شخص باشه. مخصوصا که حرف های رینارد خیلی فارسی و ایرانی طور ترجمه شده بود جالب نبود. ی چندجای دیگه هم از اصطلاحات ایرانی استفاده شده بود خوب نبود
دوس داشتم بیشتر توش جادو میبود
رینارد هم خیلی جذابه*-* و چقدر خواهر کوچولوش خوب بود😍
ویل یکم رو مخم بود زیادی سربه هوا بود دیگه. ولی آخرش عااالی بود
اینکه یک فصل درمیون اول شخص یا سوم شخص میشد رو دوست نداشتم. ترجیح میدادم همش سوم شخص باشه. مخصوصا که حرف های رینارد خیلی فارسی و ایرانی طور ترجمه شده بود جالب نبود. ی چندجای دیگه هم از اصطلاحات ایرانی استفاده شده بود خوب نبود
دوس داشتم بیشتر توش جادو میبود
رینارد هم خیلی جذابه*-* و چقدر خواهر کوچولوش خوب بود😍
ویل یکم رو مخم بود زیادی سربه هوا بود دیگه. ولی آخرش عااالی بود
November 1, 2023
One of the first fantasy novel I read
It has good plots, the characters are relatable and the well written, it has decent amount of romance ( or maybe less than decent ) the story was sweet and about the children of sleepy beauty and the consequences for fairies because of Maleficent's actions
It was one of the first fantasy I wrote so 8/10
It has good plots, the characters are relatable and the well written, it has decent amount of romance ( or maybe less than decent ) the story was sweet and about the children of sleepy beauty and the consequences for fairies because of Maleficent's actions
It was one of the first fantasy I wrote so 8/10
September 13, 2018
Enjoyable, well paced fairytale retelling incorporating Sleeping Beauty and Rumplestilskin with two compelling main protagonists. I enjoyed the world and the fact this one kept delivering surprises right up until the ending. Highly recommended for fans of well-handled retellings.
February 22, 2019
Really cute read and a great spin (see what I did there) on a classic fairy tale, the infamous Sleeping Beauty. I gave it three stars just cause I could predict a little of what was going to happen. Either way I did enjoy this cute romantic story.
November 28, 2019
I really liked this. It was an easy read. I preferred spinning silver, so if you wanted to read something fairy tale based go for this instead of spinning thorns. It was quite YA or New adult. But I've not read New adult so not the best judge of this.
January 9, 2017
A simple story but well told, with a nice structure and good pacing. No huge wow moments but I was kept entertained the whole time.
December 6, 2018
Now that’s a fairytale!
January 10, 2019
3.5 stars
January 21, 2019
3.5 stars
Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews