Maleficent by Elizabeth Rudnick

 

Maleficent By Elizabeth Rudnick

My Rating: 5 out of 5

What I thought... 

An amazing book! Predictable, because we all know the tale of Sleeping Beauty. Yet, it was totally unpredictable. Well written, by Elizabeth Rudnick for Disney.

This Disney Sleeping Beauty 'retelling' is Maleficent's side of the story, hence the title of the book.

I picked this book up, because Sleeping Beauty is one of my favourite fairytales and the title intrigued me. I thought it would be just the same story, but told from Maleficent's point of view.

When I started to read this book, I disliked Maleficent, because she is a villain. However, I couldn't help but start to like her, then feel sorry for her. And by the end of the book, I didn't want her to die. Like we all know she does. 

How wrong was I?

*Spoilers alert*

'But I took that from her. I even took her chance of happiness in the moors away from her. And now she lies here, lifeless. And I have no one to blame but myself.'

In this book we are told how Maleficent was brought up in the 'Faerie world', the moors and how her parents fought for allegiance with the human world, resulting in their untimely deaths. Now, Maleficent was just a baby when this happened. The faeries and creatures of the moors bring Maleficent up, surrounded by love and happiness. Until one day Maleficent meets a boy and falls in love.

Fairytales always begin with love and how love can be deceived. This is exactly what happens to Maleficent when the boy, later steels her wings in order to become king. That's when we start to see the Maleficent we all know and kind of love, the evil faerie whose gift to the princess Aurora, is on her sixteenth birthday, to prick her finger on a spinning wheel and fall asleep forever. 

Now, if you don't know the disney tale, then the three good fairies, who have different names in this book, take baby Aurora to a cottage, deep in the forest where the princes will be brought up. 

However, Maleficent becomes obsessed in watching the child grow up (a little creepy), by watching her secretly. As Aurora grows, Maleficent becomes soft. Until only a few weeks before Aurora's sixteenth birthday, she meets Maleficent and is adamant that she is her fairy god mother, who has been watching over her, all her life. 

And to much Maleficent's disapproval Aurora, just won't stop going to the moors, at night to spend time with Maleficent.

Now, I don't want to give away too much of the story away, so I'll stop there. I would defiantly recommend this book, it has a great twist to the original Disney story. I was in awe by it and could not put it down.