Unwritten

This book has a really sweet premise and, truth be told, I'm a sucker for all things fairy tales. Gracie is a girl out of place. Her whole life has already been written out in an unpublished story that she's never seen and, seeing as how she is as inquisitive as they come, her only goal is to find out what it says. I loved this premise and, for the most part, I felt like the book stuck true to that idea. It just took a little while to really get going.

On the list of things I loved, is the whole theme throughout this story about finding your true self, regardless of what others want for you. It's a beautiful idea to introduce to young readers. Gracie's whole life has been mapped out, but now she has a chance to be whatever she wants. The question plaguing her becomes which version would be her true self. Watching her war with herself, and grow to understand what was most important in her life, made me smile. It's lovely to see an MG character really dive deep into who they are. I can't say that this whole book had as much depth as Gracie's personal growth, but at the end of the day that was my favorite part anyway.

What made this a bit of a rough read for me was simply what I said above, that it lacks some depth. While Gracie's story is very sweet, and definitely original, it's in such a hurry to get to the climax that it skims over a lot of what I would have loved as a young reader. When I read a book in this age group, I always try to read it from both my current perspective, and from when I was a young reader. This book was a good read, but it didn't quite hit that memorable mark.