Rating: 
Summary: A good retelling of Cinderella...
Review: Cinderella, the real French story, not the sugarcoated Disney version, is my all-time favorite fairytale, and I couldn't wait to pick up Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister. This novel is told from one of the stepsister's point of view. The novel focuses on the circumstances that lead these three obscure characters to live with the beautiful girl that they hate and envy so much. From Margaret, Iris and Ruth, homeless and away from Britain, turning tricks in order to obtain a warm home in Holland to living with an eccentric artist, this fairytale paints a far more sympathetic picture of the evil trio. Of course, the story is dark and literary at times. Gregory Maguire does an excellent job in illustrating these characters in a different light. Also, I loved the fact that it was set during 17th-century Holland, which gives it the sort of historical elements that I love. This is a good, memorable retelling of the classic fairytale. Highly recommended...
Rating:
Summary: A great tale
Review: Maguire has done an excellent job in presenting a well known tale in an entirely new manner. This is a must read for anyone who has seen Disney's Cinderella and wondered about the truth behind the two ugly stepsisters.
Rating:
Summary: There's Always Another Perspective
Review: Gregory Maguire surpassed all of my expectations for Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister. I anticipated a basic Cinderella copycat (mistreated girl meets handsome prince and falls in love, where she lives happily ever after away from her cruel family), but was delighted to discover a brand new fairy tale. Maguire's unique characterization, especially with Ruth, gives the novel interesting plot twists and causes the reader to reexamine the story with a different perspective. Throughout the novel, he stresses the point that beauty comes from within, a theme that is important for all young women to understand. I would definitely recommend this book to everyone, but especially to young, teenage girls.
Rating:
Summary: Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
Review: Maguire really out did himself this time! Although, I have to admit that when I first started the book I got quite annoyed with it quickly. I was impatient to get to the real Cinderella story. But as I read I realized that Maguire needed to develop the characters, because without their personalities I wouldn't have connected with the book as well. I love how he brought the book a universal level and I found many quotable quotes!! Anyone who reads the book will have a hard time putting it down, especially to get to the twisted ending!
Rating: 
Summary: The story of Cinderella from another perspective
Review: Imagine Cinderella's story from the perspective of the two evil stepsisters and the unkind stepmother. Though at first, it may seem that the plot is ruined since Maguire has in fact repeated the long told tale of a princess, the author has managed to add his own twist to it by dropping various new ideas and details throughout the story.The novel begins when the four main chracters, Iris, Margarethe, Ruth, the Master, and Caspar are introduced. Reading the blurb of the book, I assumed that the story was centered around Cinderella-and in fact it is- only this time the point of view is changed to Iris'(one of the stepsisters). After the introduction of the Fisher family and the description of their hard life in England they manage to find a home. Unlike the rest of the community, Master takes pity on the family and provides the three women a place of refuge. Of course, in Cinderella nobody but the prince and godmother come and save her. Perhaps Maguire has gone too far in his analogy to compare the early childhood of the stepsisters to the adulthood of Cinderella. Besides that, the book has a lot of descriptive imagery and vivid details that make up for the initial twisted plot. The book's ending is a little abrupt and unoriginal; it seems as though Maguire attempts to finish the entire novel within 360 pages. Without reading the epilogue, the book can be quite confusing as many questions are left unanswered. Though even after reading the epilogue, more questions form and the reader hopes that these questions will be answered in part two of the novel (if there is one). Apart from the above minor faults, I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interesting in knowing the other side story behind Cinderella.
Rating:
Summary: Just OK
Review: Gregory Maguire's idea to retell the Cinderella story from the perspective of Cinderella's "ugly" stepsisters is a clever idea that unfortunately does not live up to the great expectations that I at least had. The story is indeed clever, and frankly, I liked the ending in the novel more than the one we see in the fairy tale. However, there is nothing in the writing that distinguishes it from the rest of the pack. The writing just plods along and much of the novel is spent on setting up the inevitable conclusion. While Iris, one of the stepsisters, has her strengths, I found most of the characters in here pretty unsympathetic. The only thing that kept me reading was my curiousity regarding how Maguire was going to make this whole thing work, which is, as I said before, done very cleverly.
Rating:
Summary: Not up to the Standard
Review: I liked the story... but of course! Its Cinderella, so I knew what I was reading from the beginning, no big surprises there. I also liked the perspective from which the book was written, and I especially enjoyed the description of different places, people and costumes.
It is by all accounts a very well written book, easy to read and to follow, with tri-dimensional characters, although they tend to be stereotypes, and an exceptional twist in the end. I think the problem for me was that I read Wicked first, and that book is a work of art. So, when reading this one, to me it was just.. a novel. It is a fun book, and a very good adaptation on a very well known story, however, no "food for thought" because it is not as profound as Wicked
Rating:
Summary: A realistic adaption to the Cinderella story.
Review: Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister is not just the "Cinderella story" but also a gloomier version from the perspective of Iris, which is the youngest of the ugly stepsisters. The author of this novel is Gregory Maguire. This tale begins in a market place in Holland. Iris (a plain but intelligent girl on the verge of becoming a woman), her retarded sister Ruth, and her compassionless mother Margarethe has just fled from England in search of a new home after their father was killed for marrying a Dutch woman. Their family soon finds themselves at the mercy of the streets of Holland after realizing that the family they had come to seek has been passed away fifteen years before they had even arrived. They resort to the lives of beggars and eventually Margarethe found a job in the house of an aspiring painter referred to as Master and Caspar the man that had a special hold of Iris's heart. There they found a decent living working in exchange for food and shelter, yet Margarethe wasn't satisfied. The book had this constant flow where ones actions were always followed by the consequences. All the events in this tale seem to just fall right into place and unfold like a true fairy tale.
It was a twist of faith that lead the family to the meeting of Clara (Cinderella); she was a beautiful young woman who's beauty was her curse but she was also a spoiled and passive. Master brought them to household of Rich Van den Meer, to paint his daughter Clara. Once opportunity arose Margarethe murders Vandemir's wife during childbirth and becomes the mistress of the household herself. Everything changes after that; Clara then resorts to the life of a maid to get by. The rest is of the book comes together quickly, they attend the ball after Margarethe squanders Van den Meer's fortune in hopes that one of her daughters will marry the prince and gain wealth. Clara also attends the ball and there she meets the prince and falls in love. There was a great fire at the ball and Clara loses her slipper, which is also how the prince finds her in the end.
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister is a story about morality. Margarethe was clearly the antagonist; her character has never changed since the beginning of the novel. It was clear the Margarethe was always evil and in the end she got what she deserved; she became a blind old woman with nothing. Maguire does an excellent job developing his characters for they expressed so many feelings and mixed emotions. Iris was a good person she was both kind and intelligent but her fault was her jealousy. Maguire did not portray any of his characters as perfect they were all just humans with their many flaws.
The story tells us there are many versions of every tale, and that heroes are not always how they appear. Though Clara should have been the hero, I felt that Iris was much more of an amiable character. Clara's character was portrayed as spoiled and frightened of the outside world yet in the end it showed that she had grown as an individual she was finally ready to be free from her fears. She went to that ball and she found her prince and lived happily for as long as she could.
I enjoyed this tale, but I would not recommend the novel for all people. I would only recommend it for those fairy tale fanatics or the younger audience, for the reasons that not all people enjoy novels that are predictable. At times this novel seemed arduous to read because no big events really happen till the end of the book. The book was slow because Maguire really developed his characters to give the readers and understanding of why they behave the way they do. The conclusion of this novel was abrupt since that was when the major events took place. However I still enjoyed it, I thought the epilogue at the end was interesting because it came from the perspective or Ruth. She never spoke one word in the novel but it seemed like she was the silent witness of everything that happened in the book and in it she tells us what ever happened to all those we had just read about. This Cinderella story didn't end with a happily ever after like most matter in life.
Rating: 
Summary: Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister was wonderful!
Review: This novel is a believable take on the Cinderella story, complete with step-family, ashes and a prince. Maguire sets the story with 17th century Holland as the backdrop. Dutch painting, tulip speculation, superstition and 17th century society/manners/customs feature largely in the plot. The main character is actually Iris, one of the step-sisters, with the Cinderella figure, Clara, as a supporting role. The characters of Iris, Ruth, Clara and the step-mother were complex, realistic and very individual. The complexity of Ruth's character was beautiful and sad, and I cared a great deal for her. The end of the story, with ball and prince, wasn't quite as good as the rest of the story--in fact, the conclusion wasn't completely satisfying to me for some reason. He tied up the loose ends too neatly, I think. But then, the fairy tale element had to be present in some aspect other than just the superstitions of the day, so I suppose the "happy ending" can be justified. On the whole, I enjoyed it tremendously. It was well written, blending history and fiction and a bit of fantasy into an deep, compelling story. I highly recommend it and will be reading the rest of his novels as soon as I can!
Rating: 
Summary: Confession: I was let down.
Review: Like Maguire's other novel for adults, Wicked, the concept behind this book is great- telling a popluar children's story from another point of view to show that the evil and the ugly perhaps were not so awful after all. Unlike Wicked, Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister is not political and complex in nature with well-drawn multi-dimensional characters, relationships, and surprises. It is a good story at points but not great, and I often found myself wondering who Maguire was writing for- a ten year-old child or the adult reader who is the intended audience. The story and actual writing seem to fall into an in-between place where maybe both, but perhaps neither, the adult nor child can find full gratification from the novel. It is interseting to see the events of Cinderella fleshed out in a new way through the eyes of Iris, one of her plain step-sisters. The story is filled with subthemes and plots focused mostly on art, beauty, and dark forces. There are many historical details centering around masters of oil painting, the Dutch tulip trade, and beliefs in witches, goblins, imps, and changelings. Strangely I felt that there was simultaneously too much and too little going on in the plot at the same time- all of the elements that would seem necessary to make a good novel were present, but none were developed deeply enough while some minor details were developed too much and felt distracting. I kept comparing the scenes in the Master's studio where Iris begins to develop an "eye" for shapes, colors, and painting to Tracy Chevalier's Girl With a Pearl Earring, and Confessions didn't come close to matching up. Many of Maguire's points keep circling and circling back upon themselves and by the end of the novel I never wanted to think of the celebrated "Young Woman with Tulips" painting again- the point and theme had just been belabored too much. There were moments of Confessions that I truly enjoyed such as when Iris and her mother Margarithe study the unsettling portrait of the magic world of horrors. I was left feeling that the eyes peeking from the bird's beak were truly staring out at me. But more often I felt that the descriptions and archaic language were contrived and that Maguire was trying too hard. At times the narrative dragged and various elements did not mesh together seamlessly. For example, Iris believes her friend Caspar whom she is in love with and who clearly loves her too is gay just because her step-mother implies he is. This ridiculous belief becomes a central plot element. Earlier Iris describes playing "Girl Stag of the Meadow" with her slow and lumbering sister Ruth. As Ruth is on her hands and knees with branches tied to her head and a foul-smelling plet over her back, "Iris kneels behind her sister, right up against her, like that bull Zeus pressing against a cow." I found this random and disturbing and somehow Maguire found it necessary to weave this image back into the plot at various points. As the novel ended I was glad that it was done and the climax was finally realized, because it felt that the ball was a long time coming with a lot of unnecessary diversions and shallow meditations with a few moments of brilliance. Happily, the glass slipper scene has a whole new context and the motivations of the characters are, of course, different from the fairy tale. I was left at the end pleased to have a new version of the Cinderella story in my mind, and I pondered if Confessions could be sold as a somewhat feminist novel, but ultimately instead of lingering visions of beautiful Clara, or tulips, or plain Iris, I was left with the disconcerting and random image of "Girl-Stag of the Meadow" in my mind and I wished it would just go away.
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