A review by brii_brii
Retold by M.C. Frank

3.0

This book is a collection of 3 short stories. 

Hooked - A retelling of Peter Pan ☆☆☆
Caged - A retelling of Rapunzel ☆☆☆☆☆
Seduced - A Hades and Persephone Story ☆☆☆

Hooked

While I liked the premise and the spin on the characters, the way this story was written just didn't work for me. I think the length of it had a lot to do with that. A good amount of time was spent focusing on Peter and Wendy's history, but I almost wish that we had Peter's pov as well as Wendy's. So much of the actual guts of this story was completely skipped over and just kind of mentioned in pieces, and I really wish that the readers could have been a part of it. If this was a full-length novel, and we actually followed Peter on his search for Dante and the Captain, I think this really could have been something. But too much of this story was left out, and it really left me feeling hollow and deflated. 

Caged 

I loved this. Tangled is my all-time favorite Disney movie, and so I went into this one with high expectations. MC Frank absolutely delivered. While I felt that Hooked was too short and should have been written as a full-length novel, I think this one was perfectly done. I obsessed over Valentine and Zella. The locked room romance was to die for and was wonderfully done. Zellas story was absolutely heartbreaking, and I was completely enamored with her character. Valentine was swoon worthy from start to finish and was impossible not to fall in love with. For a short story, this absolutely delivered with a bang. 

Seduced 

I loved this story from the start. I loved watching Poppy take control of herself after all of the abuse from her brother, and I genuinely like Hades as a character. But the longer the story went on, the less I liked it. It started to get very repetitive, and (maybe this is an asshole thing to say), but everyone whined and cried. A LOT. I know there was a lot of abuse in this book, with all the characters, but by the end of the third story, I was kind of tired of everyone crying about how awful their lives were constantly. This one was no different. After the entire story and Poppy learning how terrible her brother was, she still went back to him. And that was the moment that I was mentally absolutely done with this one. The banter between Poppy and Hades was wonderful when it was there. But there just wasn't enough of it for me. 

Also, there's a lot of God talk in this series… I just kinda skim over all that.