Reviews with content warning for Kidnapping - Grounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel

a character once remarks that Rapunzel is her own woman, and during her journey, Rapunzel proves exactly this. she comes off as rather self-absorbed at first, and rejects everything everyone tells her by quoting what she's learnt from Witch. her natural curiosity, however, soon leads to her being more open-minded. beyond everything else, Rapunzel wants to understand, not just to know. her companion, Jack, is sarcastic— if insensitive at times— but is always ready to help her and, deep inside, cares far more than he shows. they are not perfect characters, but they're real and relatable. Witch, too, is not just some evil, selfish person who doesn't care about Rapunzel (as she is portrayed in the Disney retelling). the cast of supporting characters manage to be intriguing despite their brief presence— i found myself wanting to know more about them, to know their stories, too. I've read plenty of books where the supporting characters are just there. they don't spark my curiosity. Morrison’s characters feel like people you yourself might meet while out and about. it doesn't feel as though they're there for Rapunzel’s sake, but just happened to cross paths with her.

above all else, my favourite aspect of the book was how Rapunzel dealt with Witch and all she had done. she'd been raised by Witch and had only felt her love and care, so even when Rapunzel found out that she was far from nice, she couldn't bring herself to hate Witch. someone said in their review that the story is not about how Witch should have been treated, but how Rapunzel specifically treated her, and i couldn't agree more. Rapunzel doesn't care that she is supposed to hate Witch; she loves her, and feels no regret for it. some have pointed out that this could've have been a subtle reference to abusive parents and how children can't really dislike their parents despite knowing their flaws.

i read this book for the first time when i was in 6th grade and greatly enjoyed it. recently, i remembered it while talking about fairytail retellings with my friend and decided to reread it, and, man, this might've been the best decision I've made regarding fiction books in a while. I'm 100% going to tell my sister to read it in a few years, and might even reread it (again) myself.

reading this book felt a little strange at first, but that might be because it's written for middle schoolers and I haven't read anything but ya in the past two years.

Content Warnings

aseaoftomes's review

Go to review page

adventurous lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

What an absolute delight.

This book at it's core is a Rapunzel retelling, but it also has essences of Jack and the Beanstalk as well.

This book follows our main protagonist Rapunzel, an innocent and naive girl who lives in a tower with her guardian Witch. One day Rapunzel finds out that Witch's life is in danger and gets swept up in an adventure and crosses many lands to figure out how to save her. She meets a whole cast of delightful characters, including Jack who is her main companion and has a quest of his own.

The writing of this was really easy to sink into and pretty well paced. It took me a chapter or two to really get into the story, but once I did, I was sold.

The plot loosely follows the story of Rapunzel, but it's got quite a few unique twists to go along with it. But the plot is pretty much what I described above.

The world of Tyme is incredibly vivid and rich and I loved all the time we spent in it getting to know all of the nuances and different countries and politics and history along the way. I loved the magic a lot as well. The world building was honestly one of the strongest and most enjoyable parts of the book.

Finally, the characters. I loved Rapunzel. I fully admit that it took me a bit of time to warm up to her because of how she's introduced and what she's like for the first bit of the book, but her character arc was seriously one of the best things ever. I love how much she grows over the course of the novel and I couldn't help but fall in love with her more and more as the book went on. I loved Jack a lot as well. He's such a sweetheart and is just so good across the board. And I loved the relationship/friendship/dynamic between him and Rapunzel a lot as well. Witch was also a fascinating character. Even though she's the "bad character", there's a lot more to her than that and I loved getting to see her story fully fleshed out as well. Honestly the whole cast of characters were a delight to read.

All in all, a great book and I can't wait to read the next installment in the series.

Content Warnings

More...