Cinderella: Ninja Warrior by Maureen McGowan

There are a lot of things to love about this book. First of all, the title. How can you NOT love that title? That's what attracted me to this book, and was happy to see that the story was as good as the title.

When I first picked this book to read, I wanted something quick and easy - something I wouldn't think much about during my exam week. WRONG. I got so into it, I handed in my math test early so I could read more. Oops!
When I first opened the book, I was about to skip to the first chapter when I noticed a page before it that said "How This Book Works." And I thought, "Uhm, does it not work like a normal book?" Turns out, no, it doesn't. This book is one of those "Choose the adventure" type books, where once you reach a checkpoint in the book, you choose what Cinderella should do, then go to the page that follows that result. I was genuinely surprised, and dove right in. There are eight combinations of choices that you can go through, though I'm not sure if they all lead to the same ending, since I only did one (so far).

Okay, now to talk about the actual story line. When I was a kid, I always thought Cinderella was one of the ditzier princesses. Why didn't she try to stick up for herself? I half-expected this Cinderella to be the same, but I was wrong, yet again. This story has a lot of elements from the fairytale, such as the godmother(father) but with a twist. For example, instead of the stepmother merely being a b*tch to Cinderella, here she's a PSYCHO, who physically traps Cinderella within the house with black magic and doesn't let her out. And instead of Cinderella being "blah" and singing to mice, she trains herself in martial arts with the one book she owns and her cat, Max. One thing I found really interesting, was when Cinderella snuck out not to go to the ball, but to enter a magic competition, since she inherited some of her mother's magical abilities. The winner of the competition is guaranteed a dance with Prince Tiberius, but Cinderella is only interested in the other prize: lessons from the royal wizard.

During her training for the competition, her stepmother takes her into the village for the first time in ten years. There, Cinderella befriends a "messenger boy". As it described him, I thought "Oh that's cool! She doesn't fall in love with the prince, but a servant. Now that's a twist!" That is, until he said his name was Ty. I'm sorry, but this is the one area where Cinderella gets a little clueless. This isn't much of a spoiler, but come on! Tiberius. Ty. Tiberius. Ty. He's the freaking prince, and he dropped SO MANY hints!!! Though I did like the two of them together, and the moment where she finds out he's a prince (with the outcome I chose, of course) was pretty sweet.

This book rates about 4 out of 5 on my scale, maybe even 4.5, considering how creative it is. I can't wait for to read the sequel - Sleeping Beauty: Vampire Slayer. How cool is that?!
Until my next review, au revior!
Love, Julia  :)