Or perhaps I was that way naturally.' When her beloved mother dies, leaving her in the care of a mostly absent and avaricious father, and later, a loathsome stepmother and two treacherous stepsisters, Ella's life and well-being seem to be in grave peril.

Another girl might have been cowed by this affliction, but not feisty Ella: 'Instead of making me docile, Lucinda's curse made a rebel of me. Anything anyone tells her to do, Ella must obey.

The Total Tragedy of a Girl Named Hamlet by Erin D.At birth, Ella is inadvertently cursed by an imprudent young fairy named Lucinda, who bestows on her the 'gift' of obedience.

The Princess Plot by Kirsten Boie, 2005.

I Don't Wait Anymore by Grace Thornton, 2016.

Simply Calligraphy by Judy Detrick, 2016.

And if you've read it and found more to like than I did, please take the time to explain to me what there is to like here.

Please, steer clear of this particular book by Gail Carson Levine. I hate writing negative reviews, but I had to write this one. I really just want to get this review written so I can stop thinking about The Wish. How can I like or respect someone like that?

She claims to feel bad about it, and apologizes when they find out and are mad, but when given the chance she's still perfectly ready to force them back into being her friends-on-command. She's so obsessed with being popular that she doesn't even care that people only like her because they're being forced to. Reading past that to finishing the rest of the book, though, I also realized that Wilma is frankly just unlikeable. I can only assume this is where I stopped last time). The 'girl-boy stuff' truly was too much (Wilma and her new boyfriend - both not even in high school - go to the park, lie on a blanket, and kiss passionately for over an hour after dating for like two days. Then I started reading again, and only finished because it was late and I was at my aunt's house and I didn't have anything else to read. This summer, however, I forgot just how much I'd disliked The Wish I figured my disgusted reaction all those years ago was just because of my age (all twelve years olds think romance is icky, right?), and that now I was finally old enough to read and enjoy this book by the author of several of my favorite books. I put the book down halfway through, told myself never to read it, and moved on to the infinitely superior Fairest. I only 'started' it, not 'finished,' however, because the boy-girl stuff got too icky for me. The first time I started this book was probably about five years ago, when I had just finished Ella Enchanted for the first time and was devouring everything by Gail Carson Levine that I could get my hands on.

Ever by gail carson levine