****
Mattie's an outsider at her school and dreadfully envious of her step sister Ella. Ella has the perfect life; helpful around the house, popular, beautiful, caring and attracts all the boys. When Mattie develops a crush on her step sister's gorgeous boyfriend, Jake, she rules him out of bounds, despite the class project that brings them together. Slowly, Mattie realizes that Jake is using her and getting her to lie for him. As revenge, she decides to run against him for class president. This is a modern telling of the traditional Cinderella. Set in a high school, it deals with teenage issues as well as family problems.I downloaded this book for free from Amazon and my immediate reaction to the cover was that it was aimed at slightly younger girls than teens. However, after reading about it on Goodreads, I decided to get it. It was sat in my Kindle library for a few months and I never had the urge to read it but one day, during a reading slump, I went ahead and just started it!
Although the plot to this is very cliches,I enjoyed the book very much. It was charming, hilarious and definitely a page turner. I easily read 100 pages of this without even realizing!
POSITIVES
It was free! A lot the books I download for free from Amazon are OK but bore me about half way through. They also are really easy to identify as a free book as the writing is often like an amateur. This book is completely the opposite! It has the same standard of character building and emotion as a best seller.
Despite the main character being the typical female, high school protagonist, she has a backbone! Unlike most female characters in the presence of their crush, Mattie does not stand for Jake using her and says no when he asks her to lie instead of going mushy in a love trance. Go girl power!
The book is hilarious! Mattie's well known line of "Oh my Buddha" gets me every time! Also, as a girl of the similar age, I can truly say that this book is realistic and relatable.
The plot line is simple and easy to follow so when reading it, you spend your time laughing and crying with the characters instead of thinking, "Wait, I thought he was her sister's boyfriend?!?"
NEGATIVES
Trent, Mattie's best friend had little story behind him and I felt I wanted to know more about him. It seems he is just the tee for the sake of being there instead of being a key part of the plot.
I did get slightly annoyed with Mattie and her constant rants about how fabulous her step sister is and how she feels second best. Towards the beginning of the book, that's all you hear about. That said, I did find it slightly weird how when Mattie reveals to her sister she is in love with her boyfriend, her sister we just accepts it.
The plot was really predictable. She likes a boy she can't have but they end up together, go to prom, she becomes class president. There was no real antagonist to th novel just a mean girl and I felt this needed to be built on . Also, all Mattie's problems are resolved in the space of three pages. More needed of this.
Overall, the plot was predictable but the characters and writing fabulous and hilarious. A great quick, fun read.
GOODREADS: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15833614-the-ugly-stepsister-strikes-back?ac=1
AMAZON: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ugly-Stepsister-Strikes-Back-ebook/dp/B008YIE740/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1376412181&sr=8-1&keywords=the+ugly+stepsister+strikes+back
*Although this book was free is my country at the time of my purchase, the prices may have changed.
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