Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. I love it because it is basically a squee-fest where book lovers can choose one book that they are DYING to get their hands on. Check it out!

Kill Me Softly

by Sarah Cross

 True love’s kiss just may prove deadly….

Mirabelle’s past is shrouded in secrecy, from her parents’ tragic deaths to her guardians’ half-truths about why she can’t return to her birthplace, Beau Rivage. Desperate to see the town, Mira runs away a week before her sixteenth birthday—and discovers a world she never could have imagined.

In Beau Rivage, nothing is what it seems—the strangely pale girl with a morbid interest in apples, the obnoxious playboy who’s a beast to everyone he meets, and the chivalrous guy who has a thing for damsels in distress. Here, fairy tales come to life, curses are awakened, and ancient stories are played out again and again.

But fairy tales aren’t pretty things, and they don’t always end in happily ever after. Mira has a role to play, a fairy-tale destiny to embrace or resist. As she struggles to take control of her fate, Mira is drawn into the lives of two brothers with fairy-tale curses of their own … brothers who share a dark secret. And she’ll find that love, just like fairy tales, can have sharp edges and hidden thorns.

I can’t help it, guys. I’m really, REALLY feeling the fairy tale retellings right now. I promise next week will be something completely different. But lately I keep thinking of this book–with its story that sounds like ALL THE FAIRY TALES EVER and the striking red cover with lots of ominous-looking blood-like spatter–and I just couldn’t keep myself from sharing my anticipation with you guys. Because seriously: ALL THE FAIRY TALES.

This book sounds like reading Once Upon a Time, my new favorite TV show. I’m not sure anyone could convince me that this ISN’T awesome. Snow White, the Beast, Prince Charming, and what seems to be the Brothers Grimm, maybe? KILL ME SOFTLY sounds like it’s going to be dramatic and dark and intense with lots of shout outs to my favorite old stories. Plus I’m intrigued by Mira: Is she a fairy tale character? Which one? (I swear, this is exactly like OUaT). What happened to her parents? Why can’t she return to her home? This book is SCREAMING my name, and I can’t wait to read it. Three cheers for fairy tales, friends!!

(PS. I’m ignoring the fact that the title reminds me of Roberta Flack. And The Fugees. Ignoring it.)

KILL ME SOFTLY is coming out April 10, 2012 from EgmontUSA.

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. I love it because it is basically a squee-fest where book lovers can choose one book that they are DYING to get their hands on. Check it out!

Enchanted

by Alethea Kontis

 It isn’t easy being the rather overlooked and unhappy youngest sibling to sisters named for the other six days of the week. Sunday’s only comfort is writing stories, although what she writes has a terrible tendency to come true.

When Sunday meets an enchanted frog who asks about her stories, the two become friends. Soon that friendship deepens into something magical. One night Sunday kisses her frog goodbye and leaves, not realizing that her love has transformed him back into Rumbold, the crown prince of Arilland—and a man Sunday’s family despises.

The prince returns to his castle, intent on making Sunday fall in love with him as the man he is, not the frog he was. But Sunday is not so easy to woo. How can she feel such a strange, strong attraction for this prince she barely knows? And what twisted secrets lie hidden in his past—and hers?

I love the sound of ENCHANTED. It reminds me a little bit of Juliet Marillier’s WILDWOOD DANCING with the frog and the princess (or, in this case, it appears to just be a girl from a powerful family?) angle, which is excellent. BUT THEN! Business takes a turn into ROMEO & JULIET-ville (hopefully without the whole “Let’s both die together” part) when the newly de-frogged prince and the girl turn out to be from two families who hate each other’s guts. DRAMA!

Seriously though. ENCHANTED sounds fantastic. I LOVE this spin on The Frog Prince story, which, like all fairy tales, usually ends with the frog returned to his princely form whereupon the princess is immediately in love with him. I’m excited to read a version of events that requires a little more effort and creates more tension. PLUS. What about those “twisted secrets,” huh? What’s THAT about?? Can’t wait for this one, guys.

ENCHANTED is coming out May 8, 2012 from Harcourt Children’s.