A Kiss in Time by Alex Flinn

Sleeping Beauty is my favorite fairy tale, so I was excited to see it remastered by the author of Beastly. This story has it's moments but I'm not overly excited about it now that I've read it.

Talia is a princess from a country known as Euphrasia. On the day of her christening she was cursed with death when she pricks her finger on a spindle. Another fairy, unable to undo the curse, merely makes it that she'll sleep until true love's kiss. Try as they might to avoid spindles, she still pricks her finger and falls asleep. Enter many years later a teenager named Jack who gets bored with his European tour and tries to the find the beach. Instead, he finds the sleeping village of Euphrasia, as well as a beautiful woman who he has the urge to kiss. Talia then awakes and is blamed for ruining their kingdom since they've been sleeping for 300 years. She runs away with Jack to America since her father doesn't want her anymore and she's certain he's her true love since his kiss awoke her. As she grows accustom to American ways and not being a spoiled princess, the evil witch who cursed her continues to haunt Talia, feeling tricked because she doesn't think Jack is Talia's true love, so she shouldn't have been woken up. Just as Jack realizes he truly does love Talia, the evil witch magically brings Talia back to Euphrasia first for revenge, and then to see if Jack truly is Talia's true love and can rescue her yet again.

One reason I was disappointed in this book is because to me the whole "awake in another time period and must adapt" has been done so frequently that it's old hat. True, there's not much you can do with the Sleeping Beauty storyline to make it interesting, but it just wasn't enough for me. One thing I found interesting was how Jack wasn't your typical hot guy, frat party, jock. He was interested in gardening and becoming a landscaper. You don't really see guys portrayed that way in books and I thought that was a nice touch - you don't have to be a tough macho, stereotypical guy to be a hero. One stupid note: This is based on Sleeping Beauty and Disney is mentioned but when Jack sees sleeping Talia, his first reference is Snow White. Seriously? You see a sleeping princess and your first thought is Snow White? Come on! Or did the author just not want to make it obvious? I think it would have been funny for his first thought to be Sleeping Beauty because the true love's kiss is more obvious in that storyline. But, like I said, just a stupid note that made me chuckle.

This book was decent. It's been a while since I read Beastly, so I can't really tell how they compare if you're into the remastering of fairy tales and like Alex Flinn. As a story itself, I think a lot of this book has already been done before and that is always a disappointment for me. Just the same, I hope the author continues to modernize classic fairy tales because they're still fun to read.
MMK