Callum Quinn, © 2019
Ella Enchanted
By Gail Carson Levine
The (a) story follows Ella, a young woman in the fantastic kingdom of Kyrria, who suffers from a horrible curse: she must be obedient. Whenever she is given a command, whether she likes it or not, she has to obey.
Ella keeps her curse a secret, for the sake of protecting those she loves. She lives her life with a stubborn determination, learning eventually to delay the dizzying side-effects of disobeying, but never being able to throw the curse completely. With the family cook, Mandy, as her only trustworthy companion after the death of her mother, Ella endures her curse and its consequences amid the harsh presence of her conniving father, hungry ogres, finishing school, and three horrible women who come to be her step mother and step sisters.
And the flash of light among these sinister figures is Char, the young prince who captures her attention and eventually captures her heart.
The (A) story is about love, but also self-sacrifice and the resolve to fight even when you know you may lose. Ella makes the decision to never see her best friend again, rather than terminate the friendship at the will of the insatiable Hattie; Ella wants to marry her prince, and he wants to marry her, but she lets him go for the sake of saving him and the kingdom from her vulnerability. She puts the needs of her family and friends before her own happiness.
She also fights against the curse at every chance she gets. She is stubborn, holding off as long as she can whenever someone gives her a command. She knows she’ll have to submit eventually, but she challenges herself to see how long she can resist. And finally, when it comes to saving her prince, she finds the strength inside herself to face the biggest and most painful reality—and, in turn, break the curse. Ella is a spirited and determined fighter, in possession of an intense inner strength that makes itself known once the need arises.
I have often said that Ever After is the best movie version of a Cinderella retelling; this is the best written version. I cannot remember when I read it for the first time, but I can guarantee this is not my second, or even my third or fourth time reading it. Ella Enchanted is a charming and imaginative classic, with an enjoyable lead character, delightful and deliciously wicked side characters, and a vast fantasy world full of bizarre and whimsical creatures. Yet, the magical aspects are never too overwhelming or distracting for the main strand of the story; not only can I believe the kingdom of Kyrria has fairies and elves and giants, but I can also believe they are completely natural sights amid the townsfolk, or on the road to finishing school.
Overall though, it’s the romance that always brings me back to this story. Sure, Ella and Char are in love, but it takes about a year of friendship before they come to this conclusion. And it’s a wonderful friendship—the kind of budding romance that you dream about when you’re fourteen and naïve: they write each other letters, he catches a centaur for her and saves her from ogres, he searches for secret passageways with her, they dance together in an abandoned tower room while all the other guests are downstairs, and he catches her and twirls her around at the bottom of the stairs when they slide down the railing.
It’s so sweet. And because of this beautiful buildup my heart absolutely breaks each time I read through Ella’s realization that she can never be with him!
Any complaints? Meh. In the long run I really don’t think they’re worth mentioning, but if I had to pick something I’d merely comment on how “young” the book feels, which is hardly its own fault if I make the decision to read it.
On the YA scale it seems a little more on a younger young adult side, and I feel that some of this is highly visible through the writing. For instance, there are a number of different languages used for the mythical creatures as well as people from neighboring kingdoms, and here is where my suspension of disbelief slips a little. Most of it just seems like confused gibberish, with a few pointless punctuation marks or capitalizations thrown in for emphasis. It doesn’t strike me as something that was really well thought-out or structured, it just felt like an opportunity for the author to show off a little: something that might impress and excite younger readers, but otherwise makes me annoyed and skim through quickly.
Also, Ella is supposedly a very humorous person, like her mother was supposedly a very humorous person, but the humor they display in the book never really struck me as all that funny (but it strikes Char as funny, which is what really matters, I guess). Moreover, there’s that rotten skeptical part of me that always thinks, “Why can’t Mandy just tell Ella, ‘Don’t listen to anyone’s commands but mine for the rest of your life’?”
Because that’s not how curses work, folks. That’s not how curses work.
Like I said, the complaints are so minimal that they’re not even worth mentioning. Re-reading this story as an adult, I have found that my feelings for it have not changed. I love it just as much as I did the first time I read it. It is beautiful and uplifting (most of the time), and it’s one that I could read a fifth, sixth, or even seventh time before another year has gone by.
