I received this book for free from the Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
A Mirror Mended by Alix E. Harrow Series: Fractured Fables #2
Published by Tordotcom on June 14 2022
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, LGBTQ+
Pages: 144
Format: ARC
Source: Publisher
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The nitty-gritty: A delightful blend of humor and self-aware storytelling, A Mirror Mended is the fairy tale multiverse mash-up you didn’t know you needed.
“I mean, sure, when one is looking for the lair of a cannibal queen, one expects to encounter a certain degree of spookiness. One might anticipate something resembling the Beast’s castle pre-makeover, with gargoyles and buttresses and more lightning storms than is statistically likely. One does not anticipate what I’m seeing now, which is a jagged ruin of black glass and bones that makes the Black Gates of Mordor look like the Barbie Malibu Dreamhouse.”
Last year I had a bunch of fun with A Spindle Splintered, and I’m here to tell you that A Mirror Mended is even better! I absolutely loved the second book in Alix E. Harrow’s Fractured Fables series, but I would start with the first book if you haven’t read it yet since this is a direct sequel.
The story picks up five years after the end of the last book. Zinnia Gray has been traveling through many different versions of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, and in each one she saves the princess and ensures a happily ever after before pricking her finger on the spindle she carries with her, which magically transports her to yet another world. She has just completed her forty-ninth “assignment” when a strange woman appears in the mirror she’s gazing into. The woman seems to be asking for help, and since helping princesses is what Zinnia does, she puts her hand on the mirror and is immediately transported to another world. The woman tells Zinnia she’s the evil queen in her story and she knows what’s coming next. All she wants is to escape her fate and change the ending of her story, and she thinks Zinnia is just the person to make that happen.
But as Zinnia looks around, she notices something strange. There’s a mirror and an apple, and no sleeping princess in sight. This isn’t Sleeping Beauty at all, but Snow White! For the first time ever, Zinnia finds herself in a different story, faced with helping the villain instead of the innocent princess.
A Mirror Mended is even funnier than the first book, and the characters jump off the page with sparkling dialog and interesting relationships. Harrow truly knows how to bring a story to life—not all authors have this ability, but everything I’ve read of hers has a similar joyful quality to it. The story is told in first person from Zinnia’s point of view, and she’s such a funny, warmhearted character who feels guilty about leaving her best friends Charm and Prim behind in “her” world, but she knows there are still so many princesses out there who need her help, she can’t bring herself to go home. We learned in the first book that Zinnia graduated with a degree in folk studies and anthropology and is in fact an expert at analyzing fairy tales and all the different versions of them through the ages. This knowledge is peppered throughout the story, as she uses her background to make sense of the magic world she’s found herself in. One example I loved—the iconic phrase “Happily ever after” was originally “Happily in the ever after,” suggesting a much more sinister meaning involving the afterlife. These little asides made the story even better.
There are some fun bits about “narrative” and “agency,” as one of Zinnia’s methods of helping out is to make sure the princesses (or in this case, the evil queen) understand that they can change their narratives by claiming agency and taking control of their lives. Zinnia literally sees her life as a story, with each event following the rules of story structure and narrative style. It was all very meta and self aware, and I loved the way it was handled.
The evil queen, or “Eva” as Zinnia calls her (short for “evil” lol) was such a great foil for Zinnia, and I loved that a sweet but subtle attraction develops between the two of them. We get a few brief appearances by characters from the first book, but most of the story revolves around Zinnia and Eva and their adventures in the Snow White fairy tale multiverse. One of my favorite parts of A Mirror Mended was visiting the different iterations of the story, some of them set in the future, some set in other countries, all of them slightly twisted so as to keep the characters off kilter. Zinnia knows her fairy tales backwards and forwards, but even she can’t predict what she’ll find when she goes to a new world.
And I loved the ending so much! Slightly bittersweet but full of heart, I can’t really tell if this is the end of the series or not. Harrow gives her readers a completely satisfying ending but also suggests the possibility of more adventures. There are many many more fairy tales to “fracture,” after all…
Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy. Above quote is taken from an uncorrected proof and may differ in the final version of the book.
That little excerpt you shared convinced me that I MUST start this series, because it promises to be such a delightfully fun read!
Thank you so much for sharing 🙂
Maddalena@spaceandsorcery recently posted…THE PEACEKEEPER (The Good Lands #1), by B.L. Blanchard
I think you’d love it:-)
Fantastic review! I do mean to read these.
Anne – Books of My Heart recently posted… The Fourth Angel by Suzanne Chazin
They are short and so much fun.
This book, and its prequel when it came out, where everywhere on the community and yet, even with a lot of praises and good reviews, I wasn’t interested in them. And then I had to read this review. You are evil!! My poor TBR is ever growing and you are not helping here!!
Okay okay, who am I kidding? I am always excited to add more books to that fluffy black hole!! Thanks for sharing!!
Ha ha our TBRs will both kill us:-)
I remember your review of A Spindle Splintered and that I’ve been meaning to read this author for a while, and STILL haven’t read any of her books. PUT THE PRESSURE ON ME!
Stephanie @ Bookfever recently posted…Book Blitz: Smart Girls Don’t Kiss Aliens! by Alina Jacobs + Amazon GC Giveaway (INT)
Pressure!!!
Sounds cool.
It was:-)
I love that passage you selected and your review does make me want to read this series. But, I kind of avoided these because they’re novellas and they so often just don’t work for me. Then again, I love this author. Doh, I give up.
Lynn 😀
You might like these, even though they are short, the story is so well paced:-)
It’s always great to see a sequel enjoyed even more than the first book. The series sounds like a quirky sort of read and I think I might enjoy that.
It’s very quirky and really funny.
I’m writing my review of this book! Hint: I enjoyed it as much as you did!
L.A. Young recently posted…Reading Check-In: June 4, 2022
Oh good! I’ll look for your review:-)
I’m actually listening to A Spindle Splintered right now because I have A Mirror Mended for review and didn’t realize it was sequel to the first book. So glad to hear the second book is so good!
Oh cool, hope you enjoy!
I’m really excited for this one! I enjoyed A Spindle Splintered a lot, so this sequel has been on my Most Anticipated list for a while now. I’m glad to hear it’s even better than the first one!
Nicole @ BookWyrm Knits recently posted…Top Ten Tuesday ~ Timely Books
I find it rare for a second book to be better, but in this case it really was:-)
This series sounds wonderful. Great review!
Thanks! It is, I hope there are more books:-)
It actually sounds pretty fun! I was not a fan of Ten Thousand Doors… so I steered clear from this author, but this looks quite promising 🙂
I would say this is completely different from Ten Thousand Doors:-)
I still need to get the first one and give it a try. Glad to see this one was pretty good too. Great review!
Lisa Mandina (Lisa Loves Literature) recently posted…ARC Review: Wicked Beauty (Dark Olympus #3) by Katee Robert
I agree that this was funnier, but I also thought a lot of the character’s jokes came at the wrong time and took me out of the moment. I thought it also sounded like the end though, but I’m with you – I wouldn’t mind more fractured stories!
I am now kicking myself for not picking up this series sooner because this book sounds like an absolute delight! Great review
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