Fairest

Author: Gail Carson Levine
Published: September 2006 (HarperCollins)
Category: YA Fantasy
Rating: 6/10

This is my first book by Gail Carson Levine, although I have watched the movie version of Ella Enchanted. Fairest is a twist on the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.

Aza was abandoned as a baby in an Ayorthaian inn. The kindly innkeepers took her in as one of their own. However, her roots weren't a secret, as Aza's appearance was extraordinary... in a bad way. Aza wishes she were slender and delicately beautiful. Instead, she draws the stares of inn patrons since peole think her real mother must've been a hippo. She's clumsy, wide, and tall.

However, her most beautiful attribute is her voice, and that's important in the kingdom of Ayortha, which has traditions deeply rooted in singing. Besides having a lovely singing voice, Aza is a good mimic, composer, and has the ability to throw her voice, a skill she calls "illusing." Unfortunately, illusing gets her into a lot of trouble.

Aza accompanies the Duchess of Olixo to the wedding of King Oscaro to Ivi of Kyrria when the duchess's usual companion takes ill. While there, she meets the king's nephew, Prince Ijori, who is kind to her despite the way she looks. Queen Ivi also discovers Aza's talent for illusing and decides to make Aza her lady-in-waiting so she can illuse for the queen. The queen doesn't care much for the Ayorthaian tradition of singing all the time and doesn't think her voice is very good, so she has Aza do it for her instead and lip syncs when it's her turn to sing at gatherings. Aza always worries if she's doing something wrong, but she finds that she has no choice as Ivi threatens to revoke her family's innkeeping license if she doesn't illuse. Even worse, Aza's developing friendship with Prince Ijori is shadowed by her duplicity as Ijori talks about how he can't stand people who aren't truthful.

An accident befalls the king, placing him in a coma, and Ivi becomes the ruler in his stead. She quickly steps on lots of toes, disbanding the advisory council and ignoring the country's need in a drought. The subjects begin resenting Ivi and Aza as well, since they see her as a schemer who somehow snuck her way into the queen's confidence. However, Ivi isn't taking advice from Aza. She has a magical mirror given to her by the fairy Lucinda.

When Aza and Ivi's illusing act is revealed, Aza is blamed for everything, including Ivi's poor decisions as a leader. People believe she is part ogre (due to her large and ungainly appearance), and has inherited their talent for persuasion. Sadly, Prince Ijori turns his back on Aza, as all fairytale princes tend to do (look at Prince Char of Ella Enchanted or Prince Henry from Ever After) when the girl they supposedly care for is accused of something they didn't really do. Before being placed in the dungeon, Aza drinks some of Ivi's beauty potion (provided by the mirror) and it turns her into the beautiful girl she's always wanted to be. Ivi has Aza removed from the dungeon by having a guardsman pretend to help her, although he has orders to kill her (like in Snow White). The guardsman can't bring himself to kill Aza, so he brings her to the gnomes, who will give her a place to live.

The gnomes have never been bothered by Aza's appearance when they stayed at her family's inn, and Aza finds that she's very comfortable living in their caves, which is rare for a human. It turns out that gnomes can learn to illuse, something Aza has never been able to teach to another person, and they figure out that Aza is part gnome, which accounts for her odd appearance (namely the wideness) and the way she's comfortable in their homes.

Ivi winds up poisoning Aza with an apple and Aza winds up inside the magic mirror with the odious creature that lives within. The mirror actually carries a curse, which would trap the person using the mirror's beauty potions inside the mirror upon her death. The creature Skulni is trying to get Ivi to kill herself so he can be released from his prison. Aza manages to break the mirror and the curse, returning her spirit to her body, also finding that Ijori is in the cave with all the gnomes. He's come to his senses and his entirely apologetic about his earlier jerkiness. If her weren't a prince, I wouldn't have forgiven him!

The king awakens from his coma and finds out about all the problems that have resulted from Ivi's rule. He truly loves her, but knows that she can not be allowed the chance to rule again, so he exiles her to a distant palace and abdicates his throne for Ijori so he can join his wife in exile. Of course, Aza and Ijori marry, as he loves her for being her and she doesn't need any beauty potion to make him love her.

Fairest was entertaining enough, but the main theme of the story (true beauty beneath the surface) got a bit mixed up in all the political jumble and teenage angst. Sometimes Ivi and Aza were friends and sometimes they weren't, making things weird and half-assed, like Levine was just trying to find a reason to throw Ijori and Aza together. Aza broke out of her character when she got all bitchy with the tailor, who purposely messed up her order because of the disrespectful decisions Ivi was making for their country. I know that Aza did it because she didn't want the tailor throne into prison, but she was too pleased with herself in the end. She wasn't pleased that she prevented the unjust prison sentence; she was pleased because she was going to have pretty gowns.

I really couldn't enjoy this book as much as I could because I couldn't like the main character. I disliked Aza with all her "My life sucks because I'm not pretty" and "Woe is me." Nothing she did redeemed her in my eyes. Even while being "ugly" (I doubt she was really as ugly as she made herself out to be), she was very self centered and figured that she really wasn't remarkable or beautiful beneath her outward appearance.