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3 stars! This review will be spoiler free!
Synopsis: We have two friends, Sophia and Agatha. Sophia being the beautiful, pretty in pink, princess-type and Agatha being the ugly, better in black, witch-type. Sophia dreams of being swept away by the School Master to a world where you train to be a princess in your own fairytale. Agatha tried to save Sophia from being kidnapped. All things go wrong when on the night a "bad kid" and "good kid" are supposed to be taken, Sophia and Agatha are kidnapped, and get dropped off in the wrong schools. Initial thoughts: I'd say this was about a 3 star read for me. What I liked? The magical battle scenes, the world, Agatha, the character arcs, and the ending. What I disliked? Sophie (only in the beginning), the beginning, the pacing, the simplistic writing. What I wished for? More magic spells/learning magic and more comedic relief. Plot: The pacing of this book was all over the place. First 25% was slow, not unbearable, but pretty slow. The next 50% of the book was up and down, up and down, keeping me intermittently engrossed and bored. Then the last 25% + that ending, happened so so so fast. The writing was a tad too simplistic for me, but not terrible by any means. Often I felt like I didn't have to think very hard while reading this story and I wished things were less predictable, but I'm not sure if I can hold a middle grade up to that standard. I was wishing for more magic and comedy though. I needed some occasional laughs here and there to break up the seriousness, but I didn't get any. Not to mention the author had this way of throwing themes in your face, like the whole "it's not whats on the outside, but what's on the inside" I got A LOT of that. I'm thankful that this story wasn't just a straightforward fairytale retelling. There was depth and complexity and character arcs! I just had to get past that initial 25% of laying down ground work for the story to get going. At that point I really started to like the world and the possibilities of where this story could be taken. I don't think I was ever truly overwhelmed with feeeeelss until that last bit. Throughout the book there were occasional scenes that I really liked, but I'm not blown away like the hype suggests I should be. That very last last last moment though, like nearly the last page, something interesting and unexpected happens, then the book ENDS. Like... WHAT. I literally updated by Goodreads to say "WAIT WAIT WAIT WAIT how can you just dump that on us at the end?! HOLD UP! this means...?!" On a side note: I got some Heartless by Marissa Meyer vibes with the whole pretty/sweet girl turning evil. Also a tonnnn of allusions to well-known fairytales and villain stories, which I enjoyed because it was like a dip into childhood. Characters: I lived for the female friendship. Though it was misguided and seemingly very one-sided, after the character arcs came to fruition, it became all the more satisfying to see it all play out. AGATHA is someone I can easily understand why she was placed in the Good School. She's kind and pure, but also super self-deprecating. I could never truly picture her as "ugly" in my mind. I always had her imagined as maybe gothic? but not hideous. SOPHIE is SUPER ANNOYING in the beginning. I really wanted to throttle her for how terribly she treated Agatha and seriously didn't seem to realize how horrid of a personality she had. Eventually though her character arc starts to take place and then she becomes interesting. Overall: This book was worth reading to see what the hype was about. It's worth reading if you want to quench your middle grade thirst. Do I think I'll continue with the sequels? I'm not quite sure yet. The ending of that book has me SO enticed! And I hear the sequels get better, so maybe?