Fairest: The Hidden Kingdom by Bill Willingham and Lauren Beukes - Review

Hello Book Lovers!!!

I've read Fairest: The Hidden Kingdom by Bill Willingham and Lauren Beukes in one sitting as it's a quick read so I thought why not :) And I really enjoyed it. Just like the previous Fairest graffic novels I've read, it was full of action, romance, and drama.

The story begins with Rapunzel receiving a message saying "your children". She completely freaks out as she thought her children didn't make it through birth. She decides to go on the search for her children by backtracking her life, into parts she really wants to just forget.

We see Rapunzel reface stories in her life that not even her partner knows about and she gets herself into a lot of trouble when she bumps into someone from her past that wants her dead.

When she finally finds her children, and realises that although they aren't dead, they also aren't human, she goes on a journey to find out who did this to them. After remembering getting drugged during her birth, she goes looking for the person that drugged her as she thinks that this is the person that also stole her children and changed them.

Although I really enjoyed this volume, I'm not sure I enjoyed the ending so much as I didn't think it was finalised too well. I enjoyed learning about each character and about Raunzel's past and it was nice to see how Rapunzel changed herself for the better and got out of a life that was full of trouble.

It was very clever how her hair was brought into the story and how it effected not only herself but others as well, as it was a really different take on previous Rapunzel stories I've read or seen.

I definitely think Rapunzel was a lot more bad ass than Sleeping Beauty from the previous volume and I really liked that about her. Although she changed for the better and got out of a life that was terrible, she still has that bad ass streak about her and I really like that.

As well as this story, just like volume 1, there was a short story in the back where we see Bo Peep and her friend Princess Alder tell their story of Alder's bad luck with finding true love. Alder you see is not entirely human, she is part tree and because of that her lifestyle is a little different to ours.

This was a fun short read at the end and even though it is so short, I still found I learnt a lot about Princess Alder and I hope to see her again in another one of the Fairest stories :)

Rating /5

4

Happy Reading!!!

xHannahx