Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross

Kill Me Softly

Author: Sarah Cross

Published: April 12^th, 2012

Summary:

An edgy contemporary fairy-tale retelling perfect for fans of ABC's Once Upon a Time and NBC's Grimm.

When Mirabelle runs away from her godmothers to Beau Rivage, the city where she was born, she hopes to discover answers about her parents' tragic death. Instead, she finds a group of unusual teenagers, each with a fairy-tale curse. In this strange seaside city, scenarios from fairy tales are played out over and over, and Mira has her own part in the drama: she's a "Somnolent," doomed to prick her finger and fall into an enchanted sleep like Sleeping Beauty. The problem is she's not interested in the charming (but slightly boring) "prince" who is fated to be her romantic counterpart. Mira is much more attracted to suave, handsome Felix, who bears a curse he can't, or won't, explain to her.

Review:

           After finishing "Kill me Softly", I wanted to know more. I didn't want the story to end and leave all of the other characters stories unfinished. It was such a thrill to read these fairy tales in a modern day setting. It was also great to see these stories in the Grimm fairy tale setting. We always see these types of stories following the Disney route, and as much as I enjoy that avenue it’s good to see it differently once in a while.

           We start with the typical Sleeping Beauty setting; Godmothers taking care of the girl who is about to turn 16 and wants to see the world. At first I was worried that we were just going to be subjected to this story, but we weren't. We watch the quickly changing scene of Mirabelle, or Mira, running away from home in hopes to find closure to the story about her parents’ death. She arrives in Beau Rivage and unfortunately she doesn't know where to start. She stays in The Dream casino hoping that no one will bother her. The first character we meet is Blue, a nasty sarcastic guy that wants her to leave right away. No explanation, nothing. "Just a get out of my casino." She responds with just as much attitude and then we meet Freddie. He's quiet, reserved and is trying to calm Blue down.
           Ignoring Blue’s request to leave she finds another spot to camp out. This is when we meet Felix, Blues older brother. He's kind to her and allows her to stay in his room. Overall, you're first impression is that he is the good guy. He offers to help her find her parents’ graves and feeds her. Mira starts to have more of a crush on him. Blue continues to try and ward her off of his brother and tries to get her to leave him. Mira more of less gives the proverbial finger and continues hanging out with him. 

          We begin meeting other characters like Viv and Henley, Layla and Rafe, Jewel, and Freddie’s brothers. Each of them has a different role in the fairy tale world. Through each characters personality you start figuring out who is who. I love this about the story...entwining the different fairy tales together is great and I love seeing them in this setting. Mira has a birthmark on her back, more of like a scar that she has no idea where it came from. After a beach outing one day she finds out she's not the only one with this scar and each one has a match. This is when we begin to see who is matched together, the differences of certain scars and the meanings. She doesn't like hers and when the realization that her birthday is four days away doesn't help. She then begins on the quest to see what her trigger is and how to avoid it. 

          Felix continues to act like prince charming and she continues to fall for it. Soon after a hot and steamy kiss she finds out why he is so dangerous and why Blue continued to try and keep her away from him. Now, not only does she have to race against the clock to find out secrets of her past, she has to try and avoid Felix as much as possible.  They say curiosity killed the cat... is it all too much for Mira? Did she do the right thing by going back to her birth place?

          There is so much more to this story, but I'm not going to tell you the rest. Read it. See for yourself. Overall, I thought the book was awesome. There were enough of so many different elements in this story like suspense, romance, humor, and drama. I want to see more of these characters. What happens to Freddie, Mira, Blue, Felix and the others? There were so many unanswered questions at the end. I still loved it though.