I have never seen the nutcracker, don't judge me! I was in the mood for something different this holiday season. Every holiday we read romance and second chances, but this was A MOOD!

The Kingdom of Sweets is beautifully written and captivating. Born on Christmas Eve, twin girls are both cursed and blessed on their christening by their godfather. 16 years later, Clara lives a life of charm and Natasha is outcasted. INSERT a magical nutcracker doll that takes both girls back in time to the Kingdom of Sweets!
The time between the 2 girls is so magical and heartwarming for the Christmas season. The plot was intriguing, but the characters were the prize of this story.

The whole story is atmospheric, lyrical, unique and fun. Themes of family, sisterhood, second changes, grief/loss, forgiveness and Christmas. The only thing I didn't like is that there is not a happy ending. OR at wish I was hoping for some kind of better resolution at the end.

Overall, wonderful would read another book by this author anytime of the year!

Personally, I prefer seasonal books have a sinister side and this new Nutcracker retelling fits the bill!

Twin sisters, Clara and Natasha, have been cursed by their godfather, Drosselmeyer. Clara is the be the light, charming and beautiful, while Natasha is the dark, unloved and ignored. One Christmas Eve, Natasha sees an opportunity for revenge when her godfather brings gifts for her family. A nutcracker for Clara and a demented clown for Natasha are among those gifts. Natasha soon discovers the nutcracker can open a hidden world known as the Kingdom of Sweets, where the Sugar Plum Fairy reigns and bears many gifts, but they all come at a price. Will Natasha embrace her dark destiny or will she choose the light?

The book loosely follows the story of the Nutcracker, but makes the Sugar Plum Fairy and Drosselmeyer villains. I loved that Johansen set the book in Russia during a time of much unrest and revolution, which we only discover the specific location later on. We see Natasha’s inner turmoil somewhat reflected in the real world around her. The world building and prose was excellent, and despite some parts of the story dragging a little, I really enjoyed the experience. I recommend this one if you are looking for a new take on a traditional classic.

Thank you @netgalley and @duttonbooks for the digital ARC!

A Dark Fantasy Based on the Nutcracker

Twins, Clara and Natasha, are born on Christmas Day. Droselmeyer, a magician, appoints himself their godfather. He declares that Clara is light, and Natasha is dark. In spit of Droselmeyer’s ploys to turn the girls against each other, they grow up close. Things come to a head on their seventeenth birthday. Natasha has had a passion of Conrad for years, but on this birthday it is announced that Clara will marry him.

One of Droselman’s gifts is a nutcracker that he gives to Clara which will allow her to enter the magical kingdom of sweets. Furious, Natasha follows her sister into the kingdom and meets the Sugar Plum fairy who is also full of secrets.

This is a dark retelling of the Nutcracker fantasy. The story is filled with greed and selfishness. I can’t say that I liked any of the characters. I felt sorry for Natasha always living in Clara’s shadow, but she didn’t rise to the height of a sympathetic character.

The plot is somewhat slowed by the author’s repetition of the girls’ background. For me it detracted from the story. The setting in the Kingdom of Sweets was marvelous. I thought the descriptions of the delights were the best part of the book.

Thanks for the publisher and Net Galley for this review copy.

Full disclosure: I did not finish this book. I tried. I really did, but after three week of dipping into it, suffering through a handful of pages before setting it down, and then dreading picking it back up, I have to conclude the book is just not for me.

I love the premise, but the book just drags. All of the characters are despicable and while I don’t think a book has to have lovable characters, there needs to be someone to root for. There’s also a tone to the writing style that I can’t quite identify, but that rubs me the wrong way. I think if you are a fan of this author and her style, there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy this. As someone coming to this as a new reader, it misses the fantasy reimagining mark.

THE KINGDOM OF SWEETS caught my eye for being both a reimagining of the Nutcracker story and a new novel by Erika Johansen, author of The QUEEN OF THE TEARLING series. I loved that series, and the Nutcracker story is so timeless. I wanted to see what she does with it.

I finished the book last week, and I still don't know what I think. When I look at THE KINGDOM OF SWEETS as a sum of its parts, I enjoyed it. The pacing is quick, and the story is familiar enough to enjoy but unfamiliar enough to keep me on my toes. There's a good message about family and revenge.

Yet, when I try to think of the individual elements of THE KINGDOM OF SWEETS, I struggle to find something I like. Neither Clara nor Natasha are great characters. Drosselmeyer could be interesting, but we only see him through Natasha's eyes. The Sugar Plum Fairy could also be interesting, but she is too one-noted.

The story, while intriguing, is a bit of a mess. Honestly, I can't even begin to put into words what happened and why. It all just sort of happens, and you go with the flow while reading. The only part I remember is the end, when we finally get a sense of the historical time period in which the novel is set. There are bargains that are essentially bargains with the devil. We have terrible parents and even worse extended family. Every character is terrible. The whole story is grim. It is all very Russian.

I'm really glad that Ms. Johansen published another novel. It's the first thing she's put out into the world since 2021. Unfortunately, I cannot say I liked THE KINGDOM OF SWEETS. The best part was seeing how Ms. Johansen incorporated the Nutcracker ballet into the actual story. Unfortunately, even that only lasts the first quarter of the book. Engaging but forgettable is how I would describe it, with not a single redeeming character in the entire book, the main character included.

The Kingdom of Sweets is a beautifully written and immensely compelling novel. While the main characters may not be overly sympathetic, they are fascinating amidst all their flaws.

Born on Christmas, twins Natasha and Clara Stahlbaum are cursed and blessed on the day of their christening by their godfather, the sorcerer Drosselmeyer. Sixteen years later, Clara has grown beautiful and lives a life of ease and indulgence, while Natasha is viewed as plain and often ignored by those around her.

When the yearly celebration on Christmas Eve culminates in heartbreak and danger for Natasha, she is forced to confront her unspoken despair and resentment. A Christmas present from Drosselmeyer, a magical Nutcracker doll, unexpectedly transports Natasha and Clara into the wondrous Kingdom of Sweets.

The time spent by Natasha and Clara within The Kingdom of Sweets is probably my favorite part of the story. Initially and deceptively beautiful, the horrors of the realm and its ruler, “The Sugar Plum Fairy,” are described so richly that I was both captivated and disturbed.

While the plot was interesting, I found the characters to be my favorite part of The Kingdom of Sweets. While other reviewers have mentioned finding Natasha unsympathetic, her isolation, her pain at being seen as something less by others and the way that she compensated by burying herself in her books and claiming that her curse was the reason that she could see the dark “truths” of the world around her-as opposed to it being due to the effects of pessimism and years of emotional neglect-made her immensely relatable.

Natasha is raised by a mother who is wrapped up in a laudium addiction and the attention of mediums and by a greedy father whose focus is upon social climbing, whores and wasting money.

Starving for crumbs of affection and willing to accept them from the boy who refuses to publically claim her and believing that her relationship with her sister is better than it actually is, when everything comes to a head, the choice Natasha ends up making is understandable, though not justifiable.

While we aren’t given as deep a glimpse into Clara’s life as we are Natasha’s, we are able to witness the superficial and ultimately unfulfilling nature of her existence. Being beautiful and overindulged does little to prepare her for the grim realities that she inevitably encounters.

Of the two antagonists, Drosselmeyer is the least developed and also the least interesting. Setting the events of the novel in motion due to his own selfishness and contributing to Natasha’s dismal life made his eventual fate all the more fitting.

The mercurial Sugar Plum Fairy helps to manipulate a distraught Natasha into committing a terrible act and then continues to remain within the periphery of her life in order to fulfill her own goals. Her reason for desiring revenge against Drosselmeyer is one again understandable, though the methods she utilizes are reprehensible.

When the novel reaches its climax, the setting becomes less fantastic and more rooted in actual history. There was foreshadowing prior to the change, though one can also interpret it as while the characters grow and inhabit their lives, the potential for encountering the more fanciful aspects of the world inevitably fades.

Part of me did hope for a happier ending, but that would not have been true to the spirit of the story. Some wounds-and relationships-cannot be healed despite genuine regret or a desire for absolution.

Thank you to NetGalley, Penguin Group Dutton and Erika Johansen for providing me this eArc in exchange for my honest opinion.

I loved Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker as a kid, and this book is an interesting take on that story. It's a dark retelling centering twins Natasha and Clara and how a "gift" from the sorcerer Drosselmeyer on Christmas Eve transports them to The Kingdom of Sweets, ruled by the Sugar Plum Fairy.

The story is very whimsical and imaginative in a grim way. I loved the author's version of Sugar Plum Fairy, which was very unexpected in a good way. There are some compelling twists and turns in the story, but the plot feels a bit all over the place at times. There's some repetitiveness and some events and actions of characters are confusing. I felt that the ending wasn't the strongest and didn't fit with the atmosphere of the rest of the book.

Overall, I rate the book 3.25/5. It was an enjoyable experience and brought back the nostalgia of a childhood favorite.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Dutton for the advanced reader's copy of this book.

The Kingdom of Sweets by Erika Johansen
Pub date: November 28, 2023

A dark and twisted retelling of The Nutcracker, this is truly the dark to the light of The Nutcracker I know and love. Natasha is everything wrong while her sister, Clara, is everything right.

The Kingdom of Sweets is anything but. It is decaying under all it's finery and sweetness but what this story is truly about is the betrayal of one sister against another. The unfairness and failings that happen between those we love and those we envy, or maybe even those we resent. So much greed, jealousy, and vengeance!

The ending took me aback and I'm still mulling it around. I may go back and read the last few chapters again.

I absolutely love The Nutcracker and when I saw this dark retelling of a favorite, and just before the holidays – I could not resist. I’m over the moon that I was approved for this. This book was everything that I wanted in a dark retelling. The twin angle on this story was much more surprising than I initially thought it would be. Having Drosselmeyer in a villain type role was interesting – it gave him a Maleficent feel to me. His character did always lean towards mysterious, bordering on dark in the way he appears at the Christmas party – even in the children’s picture book I have.

"Was anyone ever content with the choices they made in youth? Perhaps not, or perhaps it had nothing to do with age. Perhaps we were all fools until life taught us better, showed us what had been before our eyes all along."

My only criticism about this book is that I believe it could have been shortened a little bit to keep the story from having some lulls. There were times that the story seemed to wander and get caught up in details that didn’t further the story. I was hoping to get more of a backstory on Drosselmeyer and am a little sad we didn’t get much of one.

"If asked, The Queen would no doubt have said that her land was honest, far more honest than ours. Yet I saw it differently, riddled with half-truths and untold secrets. Her version of honesty was like Conrad’s: self-serving, constantly in motion."

If you enjoy dark/gothic retellings, this book is for you (fans of the Winternight trilogy will probably enjoy this one) and I highly recommend it. I would like to thank Penguin Group – Dutton and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this dark and twisted retelling of The Nutcracker. All opinions contained within this review are my own. Rounded from 4.5 stars.

3.5 stars rounded up. In this dark, twisted reimagining of The Nutcracker, two cursed sisters are forced to reckon with their very different destinies one fateful Christmas Eve, in a Kingdom of Sweets with rot at its core.

When twins Natasha and Clara were born, their godfather Drosselmeyer, a devious sorcerer, used dark magic to influence the course of their lives. Clara, blessed with Light, lives a charmed life as the beautiful and favored daughter, while Natasha, cursed with Dark, is plain and largely ignored, her life a mere shadow cast by Clara's glow. (Why, in my head, did I picture the sisters as Taylor Swift and Selena Gomez?) But when Drosselmeyer brings Clara the gift of an enchanted Nutcracker on Christmas Eve and the sisters are transported to the magical Kingdom of Sweets, Natasha is given a glimpse of the dark power that could be hers, if only she is bold enough to claim it.

The Kingdom of Sweets is a novel inspired by The Nutcracker, rather than a straight retelling. Erika Johansen makes some bold choices early in the novel that send it on a much more sinister trajectory than the beloved Christmas ballet, taking readers down a dark and winding path and she weaves a gothic fairy tale of resentment, jealously, sexuality, betrayal, revenge, and redemption. This is a book about growing up, about outgrowing what we thought we wanted, about living with the consequences of our choices and actions, and about paying too high a price for too little a reward. It's magical, but it's grim.

Johansen's prose reminds me of the best Victorian novels: lyrical and layered and richly descriptive. This is one of those books with writing that utterly transports you to another time and place -- in this case, to the Kingdom of Sweets with all its saccharine delights and secret decay. And trust me, you've never seen a Sugar Plum Fairy like Johansen's before; the way Johansen changed her role for this novel was probably my favorite thing about it.

Natasha and Clara are complicated female characters, both straining against the confines of the time period in their own ways. Johansen seemed to keep them both a bit at arm's length, despite Natasha's first-person narration, which made it hard for me to connect with them. I don't mind unlikable characters, but I felt like I didn't have anyone to root for -- which would have been nice in a story this dark and fatalistic.

The Kingdom of Sweets isn't a book that's going to get you into the warm and fuzzy Christmas spirit -- but nevertheless, it's a perfect read for this time of year if you enjoy dark, atmospheric fairy tale retellings. Thank you to Dutton and NetGalley for the early reading opportunity.

The Kingdom of Sweets is a reimagined dark fairy tale of The Nutcracker. I haven't seen The Nutcracker since my kid was a mouse in 2015 and the Nutcracker battled the Mouse King dressed as Darth Vader. I have a passing familiarity with the story, but not enough to be bothered by the way Johansen used the story to tell her own tale of two sisters.

Make no mistake, this is a dark fairy tale. The characters are fully fleshed out and all of them are terrible people with selfish reasons for their actions. The protagonist Natasha is the darkness to Clara's light. The two are twins that share a soul, and their godfather Drosselmeyer is a magician who wants to experiment with their abilities. When Drosselmeyer plots Natasha's death, she thwarts him and follows her sister to the magical Kingdom of Sweets. But all is not sweetness and light in this candy-coated Waste Land and Natasha is led to a terrible act that has repercussions for both girls.

Johansen weaves a spellbinding tale of magic, darkness, and selfishness against the backdrop of the turn of the 20th century. While I felt the setting was appropriate and I liked the use of a real time and place for the setting, the end felt like it was rushed and some of the reasons for actions taken by the characters felt like they weren't fully fleshed out. The ending does feel a little inconclusive, but it kept to the spirit of Johansen's tale. The use of T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land for The Kingdom of Sweets was well done and while I haven't read Eliot's poem in a very long time, I didn't find fault with Johansen's interpretation.

Overall I really enjoyed this fast paced dark fairytale and would recommend it as a non-fitting tale for the season.

Thank you to Penguin Group and Netgalley for the arc for review purposes.

As soon as I read the description, I knew I wanted to read The Kingdom of Sweets! With rich, descriptive language and a dark twist on the story of the Nutcracker, Erika Johansen takes us on a journey to the land of the Sugar Plum Fairy, but beneath this land of sugar and candy, there is a dark secret.

So settle in, grab your favorite warm drink, and snuggle up in your coziest blanket. Cursed twins, a mysterious godfather, and a thirst for revenge make The Kingdom of Sweets the perfect book for reading by the fire and the light of the Christmas tree.

Read this if you like:
• Folklore/Dark Fantasy
• Retellings with a twist
• Christmas/Winter books that aren't romance

“What must it be like to have a life so easy that every problem should be resolved by simple wishing, by that meaningless word, sorry?”
-
The Queen of the Tearling was one of the books that got me back into reading on 2019. I had subscribed to a personal shopper program and they sent me random books. This was one of them. Love her books!
This is a haunting Nutcracker retelling. I was so absorbed by these two girls, twins, one the golden light and the other the dark mistreated one. Both blessed/cursed at birth by the town warlock.
The pretty one got everything and could do no wrong. The dark one, who was plain, was disregarded to please the other and was the other's shadow.
This got dark fast once they turned 17 and received a special supernatural gifts. A lesson in you don't always know someone and be careful what you wish for.
Though they were involved in something much bigger that they had no control over the scorned sister Natasha had hit her breaking point. The carefree selfish sister Clara had to learn fast and in the end their dreams of hea were different than reality.
This was set in Russia around Rasputin's time with a lot of uprisings and unrest. The nobility always look like petty cheap tyrants in hindsight.

Thank you penguin for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.

Thank you NetGalley and Dutton for a chance to read an arc copy.

Twins, Natasha and Clara, are bestowed with a different gift from their godfather, the mysterious sorcerer Drosselmeyer. Natasha has always been cursed to live in her sister's shadow, while Clara is the favorite in the family and their town. One fateful Christmas Eve night, Natasha has the opportunity to seek revenge and change the tide of her life. Through the use of the Nutcracker that Drosselmeyer gifts to Clara, both girls gain entry to a beautiful world, The Kingdom of Sweets. But this isn't the beautiful world the girls believed it to be when they first entered. The Sugar Plum Fairy presents Natasha with a gift to be more powerful than any sorcerer. However, all gifts come with a price in the Kingdom of Sweets as Natasha soon discovers.

This story had such a strong start with intrigue and mystery and brief moments of the Nutcracker ballet I love. It is a very dark story very loosely based on the Nutcracker. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to see it the same way again after reading this story. Though this book was just not for me there were many strengths: tension between the sisters, the events of the fateful Christmas Eve party, and the opening parts of the Kingdom of Sweets. Then it took a very unexpected dark turn, and then just fell flat. The first few acts were really action-packed, and then it just became monotonous. It ended with a few twists at the end, but it was a lot to sort through to get there.

Highly suggested for those who love dark fairytale retellings.

In this very dark retelling of the Nutcracker, twin sisters Natasha and Clara, have been cursed from birth as light and dark. Natasha, the dark sister, seems to be forever destined to live in the shadow of Clara. One Christmas Eve, they are transported to the Kingdom of Sweets where Clara spends the evening living out a fantasy. Natasha spends the night peeling back the veil on the mysterious land and learning some secrets that have been kept from her. The sisters then end up embroiled in a vicious cycle of envy and misery that sends ripples through their lives for many years. It was hard to see them fail to realize the weight of their choices until it was too late. I kept hoping they would turn things around and make different decisions, but their paths seemed doomed.

I picked up this book because I love retellings and the Nutcracker. While it was much darker than I expected, I appreciated the interesting twist on the tale. Natasha’s “informed” view of the world ensured that readers are fully aware of every flaw each character possessed, including her own. Her narration was an excellent guide in this tense story where no heroes would emerge.

I was really excited to get to this because I love dark retellings and had never read one about the Nutcracker. Alas, I feel like it missed the mark and would have been happier with a different ending.

We are following a set of twins who don't see eye to eye after being cursed by their mysterious "godfather." The setup had promised, but overall, it was a letdown. For starters, the setting is creepy,cold, and atmospheric, but we don't even know it's set in Russia until the end. The other world with "The Sugar Plum Fairy" was interesting, but I felt like we weren't really given enough description. I feel like the description was lacking due to the fact that we just kept jumping around until we eventually ended up in the climax of the story. After we repeated dark and light more times than I can count and reminded the reader that her "light sister" Clara is better and more loved.

At about the 50%-60% mark, we really start picking up steam as she discovers the mirror and finds the toy maker. At this point, I was 100% on board with the story and was excited to see how it would end, but when she chooses not to become the next "Sugar Plum Fairy," I was utterly disappointed. It was a perfect setup for a villain story.

Finally, why didn't we learn why her "godfather" left with "The Sugar Plums Fairies" son. We needed more backstory to sympathize with him along with Natasha towards the end. I also could have done without the historical additions. I felt it was unnecessary and kinda pulled you out of the story and the folklore vibe it has.

The creepy descriptions made me want this to lean more horror. I grimaced at parts and loved it. Johansen's writing is fast-paced and easy to binge. This book is a great transtion between fall and winter. If you want a book that's easy to read,dark themes, and features a HEA, this is for you.

This dark retelling of the nutcracker had me shocked and enthralled throughout the read.

In this version, Natasha and Clara are twins born on Christmas Day, with Drosselmeyer as their godfather. The twins are opposites in every way- Clara is light, with a bubbly, effervescent personality, while Natasha is the dark twin, always in her own head and never chosen first. One Christmas, Drosselmeyer and his boys bring gifts to the family’s holiday party that seem to come to life, taking the girls on a dark journey.

I thought this was a fascinating take on the classic tale. It was very dark, with haunting vibes. Nothing is as it seems once Natasha and Clara travel to the Kingdom of Sweets, and that part of the story was particularly entrancing. Natasha easily sees the dark, twisted parts beneath the magic, and the author wrote such vivid descriptions that easily painted a picture in my mind as the girls traveled through the kingdom.

The relationship between the sisters appears harmonious at first, but it too has dark undertones. Natasha is an interesting narrator, making plenty of morally grey choices over the course of her life. Her motivations are clear, but she tends to take things much too far and goes to shocking lengths to conceal the things she has done.

I do wish we could have spent a bit more time in the kingdom of sweets, as this was my favorite part of the story. The book travels to several other locations and relies heavily on fantasy elements to move the lot along, which could get slightly confusing at times. Overall, I found this to be a unique and intriguing retelling of a classic that we all know and love.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Dutton for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion. I’d rate this one 3.5 rounded up to 4 stars.

Hello Fellow Readers,

Before I start getting into the nitty gritty of my review I will admit that I am not as familiar with the story of the Nutcracker as others might be, but despite this, I felt this was the perfect book to kick off this holiday season (even with it being as dark as it is). Johansen's writing was imaginative and beautiful and I very much enjoyed her how very descriptive she but not in a way that felt too much.

This book is very much focused on Natasha 'The Dark Sister' and the consequences of her actions throughout the book, she's not a very likable character but I don't think any of the characters in this was likable or meant to be liked. This was fine, considering the nature of the book. I did very much enjoy the first part of The Kingdom of Sweets but admittedly the middle of the book lost a lot of its steam. There were a lot of parts that seemed to drag on. The ending did pick up a bit but I am not sure if I liked it or not.

There was also a lot of repetition about the twin sisters and how Natasha was Dark and Clara was light. Yes, I get that it's important to the plot to understand why Natasha and Clara are the way that they are, but you don't need to constantly remind me about it.

Overall, a gothic fantasy retelling for those who need a bit of darkness in their holiday reads.

Full disclosure: I was given a copy of this book by Dutton and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Christmas is around the corner, and that means more adaptations of timeless stories like "The Nutcracker." Like many others, I grew up watching many versions and hearing its luscious score in television shows and films like "Fantasia." The characters and music have inspired many books, movies, and songs. This includes today’s subject "The Kingdom of Sweets" by Erika Johansen. It’s a dark and fresh take on the classic tale.

"The Kingdom of Sweets" is about a pair of twins cursed by birth whose lives are forever changed on one Christmas. When Natasha and Clara Stahlbaum were born, a mysterious sorcerer named Drosselmeyer bestowed them with their destinies. Clara is given light, and she becomes the favorite and grows into beauty and ease. On the other hand, Natasha is disposed with darkness and is perceived as being ugly. As a result, she stands in her sister’s shadow. But on one Christmas Eve, Natasha gets her opportunity for revenge, for Drosselmeyer brings a Nutcracker to the party, which provides an entry to the Kingdom of Sweets – a deceptively beautiful world. In the land of snow and sugar, Natasha encounters the Sugar Plum Fairy, who is full of gifts and bargains and is much more powerful than Drosselmeyer. As Natasha uncovers her dark destiny, she must reckon with the earthly and magical powers and decide on where she truly belongs.

Before I begin with this review, I want to mention some personal connections with "The Nutcracker." When I was 5 years old, I danced as one of the clowns in my dance class when they were a part of "The Nutcracker" recital. Then, in my junior year of high school, my all-girl choir class got to sing the “Waltz of the Snowflakes” at the end of Act I for a production at the Detroit Opera House. Those were some wonderful experiences.

This is truly a fresh take on the story. Apparently, Johansen was inspired to write "The Kingdom of Sweets" upon asking why Drosselmeyer singled out Clara for the special gift in the original tale and ballet. I love the different interpretations of the well-known characters. The Sugar Plum Fairy in earlier versions tends to be a fairy who happens to be the one everyone looks up to in the kingdom. In this novel, she rules over the kingdom with an iron fist and makes it look different depending on who is visiting. LIke Natasha, she too is hell-bent on revenge. With Drosselmeyer, he is portrayed as a kind old godfather and inventor who disappears after he gives the Nutcracker to Clara. In this book, he is much more of an enigma who has experimented with the dark arts and might have more nefarious motives. Also, the family is indebted to him in many ways, including financially. And then, there is Clara. In many adaptations, she is a nice, albeit a bit bland, girl, who gets sucked into fighting some rats and the world of sweets. "The Kingdom of Sweets" does an overhaul on her by making her a beautiful, but spoiled teenager who gets everything she wants and doesn’t get punished. While I understand Natasha’s twin bond with Clara, I despised the latter because of how selfish she was. Clara was like Aurora from "Sleeping Beauty" except unlikeable.

I understand that some readers didn’t like how every character was bothersome. I think that this was deliberate. Since Natasha is bestowed with darkness, she sees the wolves in almost every person she encounters. Hence, the flaws are going to shine brighter from her point of view. With that being said, some reviewers mentioned that she is so unlikeable that they didn’t want to root for her. I will admit that Natasha tested my patience sometimes. She commits some horrific acts like one on Clara in order to be with the boy she thinks she loves. At the same time, the feelings of being left out and having something taken away from you with little to no reason at all are ones that I know all too well. Natasha has a hard time moving on from various injustices, and so do I. In addition, she realizes overtime that she has some lightness, while Clara possesses some darkness. On a side note, there wouldn’t be much of a story had Natasha simply let go of her love much quicker.

Now, let’s talk about the titular place. Despite its name, it isn’t so sweet. I mean, it was at first because it was designed to reflect the emotions of the human who enters it. For example, when Clara arrives, it is described like one would expect in the ballet with lots of snow on the outside and pink on the inside. The kingdom remains that way when Natasha gets in and enters the ball, but overtime, it becomes more dark and spooky to mirror her mental state. This too was a unique interpretation of the location as things are not always what they seem to be.

Despite my praise for the book, there are two things that bother me about it. The first is Natasha’s name. Why Natasha? In "Nutcracker and the Mouse King" by E.T.A. Hoffman and in the famous ballet, Clara has two siblings: a brother named Fritz and a sister named Louise. If it makes one feel better, I didn’t know that Clara had a sister until I started doing research for this review. Fritz is present in The Kingdom of Sweets, and he slowly descends into madness after he encounters the Nutcracker for the first time. But, there is no Louise. I’m assuming that Natasha is supposed to be Louise, but why? Did Johansen think that Natasha was a more suitable name for the dark one? If that’s so, she could’ve incorporated Louise like having the main character be named that, but when she leaves Russia, she could change it to Natasha to start anew, or vice versa. This would’ve paid tribute to the original sister while still maintaining the author’s interpretation of the material.

The second is the epilogue. The book itself is structured like a 5-act opera with an overture and curtain. This is ironic given that the best known adaptation of "Nutcracker and the Mouse King" is a two-act ballet. I don’t have a problem with this since it gives the story more structure than the ballet does. My problem is that the epilogue aka Curtain is unnecessary. It details the life that Natasha lives after she leaves Russia and includes what happened to that country when it was transformed into the Soviet Union. The novel sprinkles in some subtle historical references like Ratsputin, Lenin, and even Dracula throughout, for even fantasy books are rooted in some form of reality. However, the Curtain provided this more in a more heavy-handed way. Sometimes, it’s best to leave it to the reader’s imagination as to what happens at the end. I wish it would have done that.

Overall, "The Kingdom of Sweets" is a unique retelling of the beloved story of "The Nutcracker." The darker tone brings out certain elements always present in the tale, but not always acknowledged, especially why Clara is chosen to have the nutcracker. It’s not perfect, but it’s a well suited story for this time of the season. I would recommend it to those who love stories about cursed sisters and the many versions of The Nutcracker. The book will be out tomorrow, so go check it out!

A retelling of the classical Nutcracker story, but this time the story unfolds so much more dramatically that you just have to ignore that music playing in your head.....yes, I hear the Nutcracker Suite, too. Twin sisters doomed to live their lives differently, never sharing good times or bad, but very much aware of the differences in their lives. When the choices made in The Kingdom of Sweets could mean bringing joy and light to a sister who has known neither, this holiday classic will never be the same.