Cover Image: Malice

Malice

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Member Reviews

What a amazing book! I feel in love with this one. The story is spectacular, all the characters are super vivid. I recommend with my heart.

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Alyce is an outcast. Known as Dark Grace, she is a half Vila, a race many consider to believe are vicious monsters. Tormented and abused by many, she is baffled when she meets Aurora, the Crown Princess. She treats her with kindness and doesn’t seem to care what Alyce is. Teaming up, the two try to find a way to break the curse that has been placed on the Briar heirs, including Aurora.

There was so much to love about this book. I loved the origin story. It felt fresh and exciting, plus it being sapphic? Count me in!! I enjoyed Alyce’s voice too. There was something captivating about her sarcasm that I fell in love with.

Now, I would have loved more build up between Aurora and Alyce. Everything between them felt like it happened so fast and I would have loved some time for that to slow down and be more of a slow burn between them. They were great together and I loved their relationship, I would have just loved more buildup between them.

This was good and I’m eager to read this again before revisiting the sequel.

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Malice by Heather Walter was pitched to me as a Sleeping Beauty/Maleficent retelling, but it far exceeded all my expectations.

Walter’s reinterpretation of the classic, and even her reinterpretation of the misunderstood Disney’s version of Maleficent, was refreshing with her own spin on it, with an interesting magic world building, and a beautifully romantic and modern twist on true loves kiss and the angsty, brooding, nontraditional love interest

I can’t wait to read the next book!

Thanks NetGalley for the arc!

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(5/5⭐) I regret not reading g this sooner! I loved Malice! This is a very cool Sleeping Beauty retelling and I can't wait to read the second one. I could not put Malice down once I started.

Thank you Netgalley for the e-ARC

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I have to say I try to say away from a lot of retellings. I want to read original stories but with that said, I did like this book more than I thought I would. The clever way the author added her own twist was exciting to me and I like it. I wanted just a little more in the end but all in all for me this book was not bad at all. *This book was given to me for free at my request from NetGalley and I provided this voluntary review.*

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Sigh I wanted to really love this story but sadly it fell a bit short for me. It could just be the time in my life I'm reading this book but I found it to be slow and very tell not show kind of thing and what i mean by this it feel bog down with explain everything that going on and I stop caring about half way though the story about anything that going on. there a curse and they need to break it and how they do it is just feels like the author is do check boxes of what need to be in this book. over all I just felt meh about the book i didn't love it nor did I hate it either. I'll continue reading the series but it won't be top priority either

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You had me at storybook retelling. So magical and beautiful. I love seeing people take something we all know by heart, and breathing new life into it.

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I really liked the premise of this book and think there should be more sapphic retold fairytales. I enjoyed Spindle Splintered that was also published this year, but this one was a complete miss for me. I just struggled with the worldbuilding at the start of the book. I didn’t find the premise for the society consistent and had trouble suspending disbelief. However, I had to keep myself from giving it two stars for the ending. It was a mess, and I won’t say more here because of spoilers, but I felt like it ruined many of the earlier themes by just metaphorically (and to be fair literally) setting everything on fire. It just felt like a mess to me at the end. This is a highly rated book with many people waiting for the second so your milage may vary, but it was very much not for me.

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Absolutely loved this queer fantasy novel! This was a twist on the classic of Sleeping Beauty, and it worked so well. I’m really looking forward to seeing where this story goes next!

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One of the best Sleeping Beauty retellings I have read In a long time. Alice (or Malice which is she so rudely called) is so raw, open and misguided that she truest believes she is the evil one and unworthy of love.

With the help of some very key players (including the crown Princess) she starts to realize, maybe everything she was ever taught was wrong.

How will she get from under the watch of the Royal family, the Graces, and everyone who mistrusts her because of her gifts? Are the people willing to change? And is true love really waiting for her in the end?

Cannot wait for the sequel!

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This is a great start to a new duology and a debut author. It's a bit of a slow burn fairytale retelling and what's great is the originally to it. hearing someone put their own twist on it makes it more exciting for me. I would say the story doesn’t actually get going until you’re 100 pages in. When Aurora finally shows up, that’s when things get interesting. But I wasn't too interested in the info dumps because it was as much world building as you get in the story.
Full review to come on YouTube.

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Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this book.

When I first heard about this sapphic fairytale retelling I instantly added it to my tbr. I adore retellings and books with queer main characters, so I was expecting to love this one.

Unfortunately I just didn't get along with the writing style and there was a little too much info dumping for me, the book also had a few tropes that I don't typically enjoy, I still liked a lot of aspects of this book though, from the lovely budding romance to the super cool premise.

Overall, I would recommend this one to fans of fairytale retellings, especially lovers of Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty!

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A big thank you to the author, Heather Walter, the publisher, and NetGalley for providing me an ARC in exchange for my candid review.

Hmmm......don't really know how to rate this book. On the one hand, it was an interesting remake of the Sleeping Beauty fairytale with the kiss that breaks a curse is from a female witch. Not a problem, I thought that was fine. I guess that the problem that I had was the very black, bleak ending to the book.

It was an interesting read, I liked the revamp of the classic fairy tale, but didn't like the very dark ending.

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This is a fairytale retelling of Sleeping Beauty. It was not what I expected but I enjoyed the retelling with its unique spin. I would rate this a four of five for a YA book. Netgalley provided this ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.

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I love fairytale retellings, I love to love the villain, so when this book showed up, I pounced! Add in the LGBTQ+ aspect, and *chef's kiss* amazing!

I loved the spin that Walter put on this classic Sleeping Beauty retelling.

I loved the world building, the magic system and basically the book. The interactions with characters was enjoyable as well.

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Malice // by Heather Walter

As it happens so often, by the time I get around to actually reading a book, I've already forgotten the description of it. I just know I really want to read it. And with multiple reader friends recommending it, I had no hesitation when I did finally pick this up. I dove right into it and let me tell you, I barely put it down once I started.

Looking back at it now, the description clearly says that the main character is a villain. Of course, I did not remember that though. So I went through the first half of the book learning about this young lady, enjoying her magic that is obviously quite different from everyone else's, learning about her take on society's rules, and cheering on her small victories -- all the while waiting for her big moment. And oh that moment came! This is truly a villain origin story and I am here for it! This is such a fun retelling of Sleeping Beauty with a unique take. While it isn't actually marked as YA, it does remind me of their usual writing style for fantasy - something I often don't really enjoy but that really worked for me here.

I do wish there was a little more description of the world and the magic system, maybe a little more intricate character work, but to be honest, the action swept me along so much that I didn't even think of those things until it was over. So clearly despite those short-comings regarding my personal preferences, it still was an excellent read that provided enough fun and action that look past those things. I definitely recommend this read and cannot wait for book 2 to come out!

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

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Malice by Heather Walter is a great retelling of Sleeping Beauty. Dark and lush and well written. Great story.

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This was a wonderful retelling of Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of the villain! You could see the influence of the original story throughout, with it still being it's own original story.

I thought the romance was rather forced, but I'm hoping it's further developed in book 2. The world in this book was also very well fleshed out and I found the magic system to be intriguing. I liked this book a lot and am definitely planning on reading book 2.

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I am mixed in how to rate this book. Personally it is not for me and one I did not finish, and that’s fine. Sometimes books just don’t click for me people and that has nothing to do with how well the story is written. I do think it is a well written book and I can see why people love it so much. Just not a book for me.

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Many readers will love this book. I’m simply not the right reader.

The beginning hooked me. The magic system fascinated me, and I loved Alyce’s character.

But the story drags. The 469 pages could’ve easily been cut down to 350.

The plot meanders, never really committing to something specific. What we have is hints at lots of themes telling us we should feel outraged or enchanted or whatever else, while showing us none of it.

The romance doesn’t feel like a romance at all until we’re suddenly rushing into a sex scene. We don’t see the buildup leading into this proclamation of intense love. Instead, it feels almost like a business relationship turning to a cautious friendship, then bam, they’re burning for each other as if the fire had been there all along.

None of the characters are well developed. We’re told a lot about them, but we don’t see most of it in play.

The last 20% of the book explodes with action, some of which didn’t ring true to the characters for me. We have the major cliffhanger, as well, so if those bother you, then wait for the second book to be released before reading this one.

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