A review by ashley_mrose530
Sleep Like Death by Kalynn Bayron

adventurous emotional mysterious medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was a really good fairytale retelling.
At first I didn't see how the story was going to relate to Snow White. I saw a Queen that loved her daughter and they were both trying to save their kingdom from a wizard who was very cruel to everyone he granted wishes to. It was so vastly different from the Snow White story we all grew up with. But then the magic mirror was brought into play and I started to see glimpses of the original story but it was still so different that it kept me from predicting where it was going to go and I'm so glad for that. I loved learning things along with the characters. 
Eve was so stubborn and headstrong, ready to jump into a fight at any point at the beginning of this book and it was heartbreaking but beautiful to watch her grow as she learned that she wasn't invincible and sometimes she can't protect everyone.
We lost a few great characters in this one and I was so sad to see them go.
Mekhi was especially hard to see because he was mostly sacrificed for Eve's character growth which is always difficult to grapple with, but I think it was necessary here because she needed a wake up call. I don't think she would have grown otherwise.

I thought the interweaving of multiple fairytales was so interesting here. It kept the story new and exciting and I loved the moment I realized that the Knight was Rumpelstiltskin. I will say that it got a little repetitive at the end though. When Eve was going over Rumpel's story with Maeve and Clio they were basically rehashing that she was related to the girl he made his great mistake to which we already knew. I'm not too sure why that had to be added to the end. Like she learned a little more about who the girl was, but that wasn't the thing that was pointed out in the exposition of that part, it was only the "omg we're related to her" thing and I thought that was weird.

I will say that this story started off a little slow as it was trying to set everything up. Because there wasn't an immediate connection to the original story of Snow White, it had a lot of world-building to do to start off and it didn't draw me in as much as I wish it had. But once I started seeing the Queen hiding something from Eve and the mirror was brought in, it started to pick up.
I would definitely recommend this to anyone who enjoys fairytale retellings.