The Princess of Thornwood Drive
I picked this up from a recommendation of “best sci fi and fantasy lists” (which was less fantasy and more a list of fiction that the author likes), and thought the premise was interesting. Two sisters, one of them just recently recovered from a coma, and the other taking care of her lives very different lives. One of them lives in the real world, with real issues like making house payments, finding a placse for her sister to live, and juggling multiple jobs to make ends meet, the other lives in a fantasy world where dragons are around and magic happens.
They both lost their parents in a terrible accident, except the fantasy sister believes them to be still alive. They then go through multiple trials and tribulations and have to come to terms with their situation and how best to deal with it. The story is told in chapters, with each chapter representing each sister’s point of view and it starts off quite interestingly and with some heart wrenching moments. As someone who’s taken care of a parent who fell into needing round the clock care, some of the things the real-world sister has to do was very familiar and brought back memories.
The novel however becomes highly predictable and not very interesting towards the middle and the end. the big bad was foreshadowed maybe 4 chapters into the book, and the story plays out pretty much exactly how you’d expect. The sacrifices made were obvious, and the happy ending was disgustingly saccharainsh. The better outcome would have been the real world sister having to care for her sister the entire life and no rich uncle coming in to save them, but this isn’t my book or my story.
I can’t really recommend this book because I believe the story’s been done better before, not exactly like this of course, but the themes remain the same, the writing more skillful and the plot is better. I was bored in the middle of the book and finished it mostly to make sure my predictions were correct.
In short, a competent work, worthy of 3 stars, but probably not worth your time into 4 stars territory.