Book Review: Wretched
Grief is a weird thing. It’s the only emotion in the world people claim to understand yet treat as an inconvenience. “Time heals all wounds, Evie.” Spare me. Time heals nothing. Just gives things more space to grow and fester and rot.
So I’ve really enjoyed Emily MacIntire’s ‘Never After’ series. I quite literally got hooked on her eponymous 1st book ‘Hooked’ and I quickly bought the rest of the series to see where she takes Fairytales. Sure, they’re spicy. Who doesn’t love a little bit of smut here and there - but I also enjoy them for the fact she turns the stories on their head. Who knew we’d end up rooting for the villain to win? Perhaps they were much more 3 dimensional than the static-dimensional villains we’re led to believe.
This time we enter the world of the Wizard of Oz. The world is not so magical as it is seedy and dangerous. Instead of munchkins, you have drug lords and the Irish mafia. Looks like we’re not in Kansas anymore Toto. Our villainess is still the Wicked Witch of the West, but who knew Dorothy was as unhinged and as conniving? Not me. We all end up hating her, in case you didn’t realise… Dorothy is still the antithesis to our lovely villainess. There are some wonderful nods to the original story - ‘The Flying Monkey’ is the name of the opium drug that has made our villainess famous. The yellow brick road leads to our villainesses’ secret cottage and lab, amongst others. Our male lead is a police man and he is determined to bring down the mafia and wipe the streets clean of ‘The Flying Monkey’… that is if he doesn’t end up sleeping with our villainess - which he does, by the way. In case that wasn’t obvious. This is a spicy novel.
As much fun as this book was to read, it occasionally got tiresome. And I mean that in the dialogue I was forced to read. Okay, cool so the mafia is a good foil for villainy, but how they spoke was like a bad joke. For one it was far too corny at times, it read less like the ‘Sopranos’ and more like a GCSE drama performance trying to be ‘The Sopranos’. For those who don’t know, think of it like a cheap knockoff you get at the dollar store. Even the police dialogue does not escape scrutiny - which is a shame because our male lead is a police man. Some of it isn’t great, which is a real shame as it detracts from the storyline. The storyline itself, looking at the bigger picture, is pretty cool. I love fairytales and a good fairytale re-telling, what I do love about these particular re-tellings is that you do root for the villain to win. And you guessed it, she does.
I will say, that if you have read the series then you will know that there is a formula to them. Not in the same way that Ali Hazelwood does or Ana Huang. The settings are different, times and occasionally the worlds are fantastical. So it makes a change. It made an enjoyable read and I’m looking forward to the next one. That being said, I could take or leave this book, ‘Hooked’ is still my favourite so far in the ‘Never After’ series.