Sculpting Fables - Rachel Huffmire - ★★★★.¼

AUTHOR: Rachel Huffmire

NARRATOR: Rachel White

SERIES: Mirror Chronicles, #3

GENRE: Fairy Tale Retelling + Science Fiction.

PUBLICATION DATE: October 28, 2021

RATING: 4.25 stars.

In a Nutshell: A YA SFF novella in the Mirror Chronicles series, narrating the story of Rhodopis with a time-travel twist. As clever as the other books in the series. Excellent as a Cinderella retelling. Technically a standalone work, but better if you have read at least Book One of the series to understand the intricacies. Recommended.

Plot Preview:

1324 BCE. Egypt. Rhodopis is tired of her life as a slave in a Roman aristocrat’s estate. Facing constant bullying from his two daughters, Rhodopis dreams of buying her way to freedom. Little does she know that her story has caught the attention of a young American lady from many centuries ahead, the year 2070 to be precise.

The story comes to us in the third-person perspective of the key characters.

Goodreads has marked this book as the third in the Mirror Chronicles series, probably because it was published in that order. However, it is a standalone novella that can be read independent of the series. (This is especially important to know if you come here straight from Book Two: Spinning Briar, hoping for a resolution of that crazy cliffhanger. Not gonna happen! 😕) At the same time, this book assumes that you are already familiar with Keltson, his time-travel agency, and his modus operandi. So I suggest you read this at any point AFTER reading Book One: Shattered Snow because this novella doesn’t offer any explanations about the time-travel mechanism.

The story of Rhodopis is most known for being the original Cinderella tale. In that sense, this book also works as a Cinderella retelling. And an unusual one at that! I loved how this not just incorporated the Cinderella story but also dealt with its logical flaws. The twisty take on the glass slipper was my favourite.

Rhodopis is, as expected, the star of this show. I love how well her true personality shines through even under the façade of submissiveness she has to maintain as a slave. She wasn’t portrayed as too weak or too strong, but with just enough gumption to be convincing. Her thinking and her behaviour feels appropriate to her age.

At just about 150 pages long, this book isn't as overloaded with characters as its companion novels. Other than Keltson, no main character from the earlier books makes an appearance in this work. The focus of the plot is mainly on Rhodopis, though we have three more interesting characters other than Keltson, each from a different timepoint and each sketched well despite the limited page space. Oh, and there is a very special guest appearance from a person I absolutely didn’t expect to see in this plot. I loved the way his life story and his work was threaded into this narrative.

The plot is fairly straightforward, with even the time travel being relatively linear. There’s only one main timeline to follow, not as much back-and-forth as before. No needless digressions or fillers. As always, the dates are clearly marked to help us keep track of the timeline. It was amusing to see dates from the Gregorian calendar used for the BCE period, but I can definitely understand this creative licence and also appreciate how the imagined dates went in the right order (like, 19th Sept being before 13th Sept.)

This doesn’t mean that the magic is missing. This has exactly the same delightful mash-up as the earlier two books, with fairytale, science fiction, fantasy, romance, and historical fiction all working in harmony to create a memorable experience.

Despite the shorter length, the book manages to cover a few interesting themes such as the plight of the slaves, the classism, gender discrimination, predestined roles, and restrictions of the historical era. There are also some memorable thought-provoking quotes. The romance was clean, but a bit too insta for my liking. However, that’s a feature of the original fairytale as well, so I cannot hold it against this novella. And it was sweet enough to please even this Grinch.

The Egyptian setting adds a further novelty as we rarely get to see this location in this genre. The author seems to have researched the time and place well even for such a small book. It was easy to visualise the locations and the people of the era. Of course, the teenagers and their frustrations felt relatable even today. I suppose teen angst is timeless! 😄

🎧 The Audiobook Experience:

The audiobook, clocking at 2 hrs 44 min, is narrated by the same talented narrator who read the earlier books of this series. Rachel White is one of the most talented narrators I have had the pleasure of listening to, and her performance enhances this already-great novella.

All in all, this was a clever little novella with a unique take on the Cinderella story. While I was a little disappointed to see that the book doesn’t *continue* the series and hence I still need to wait to discover what’s next after the cliffhanger of the second book, it was fun to read this sweet little retelling full of sci-fi magic and mayhem.

Much recommended to retelling fans. The book is written for the YA age group, but this story works well enough for older readers as well. As I said earlier, try to read the first book of the series before giving this novella a try.

I received a complimentary copy of this audiobook from the author via StoryOrigin. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the audio version.