I really enjoyed Farrah Rochon’s The Boyfriend Project series and Pardon my Frenchie, but she doesn’t seem to have any adult audience books scheduled for release so ended up deciding to check out this entry into the Twisted Tales series. I have only read one other one from this series, which was a Beauty and the Beast focused story. These are all “What if” stories, giving the authors space to explore within those worlds.
I was maybe a chapter in when I realized that I hadn’t actually picked up enough of the details behind The Frog and the Princess from pop culture to have a true understanding of the twist so had to take a quick Wikipedia break for the summary to understand how much of a difference the “what if” scenario was causing here.
The novel starts as Facilier tries to get his locket back from Tiana. While his offers are enticing (owning her own restaurant, her father returning from the dead), Tiana holds strong until Facilier tries another tactic, convincing Tiana that the locket’s destruction will bring harm to hide around her. This was what Tiana needed to hear to make deal – not that she would personally gain, but that it would allow her to protect people she cares about.
The novel picks back up almost a year later as preparations for Mardi Gras are in full swing. Tiana has her restaurant and it’s the result of her hard work even if it isn’t her dream location, her dad is returned from the dead, and she is staying far away from Naveen. Only Tiana remembers what actually happened last year (and Louis but even he doesn’t know all the details), and she is keeping her head down, focused on business, away from frivolousness and romance. But as the one year mark approaches, Facilier is starting to make new demands and weird things are happening in the city so Tiana is going to have to face what she did and get help from the very people she has been avoiding.
I like the concept of the series but I read the first one years ago and only now picked up a second one – in other words, they are very much light and don’t go as deep as other fairy tale retellings. They are classified as YA but I think they veer towards the younger side of YA. Nothing wrong with any of that but I am definitely not the target audience for these and they just don’t have that thing that some MG and YA novels have that make them stand out and feel like entertainment for all ages. Enjoyment of these might be more dependent on your familiarity with the original fairy tale or Disney movie than the author of any given book, too, so that might be another factor to consider when exploring some of the titles in this series.