Summary: The first kidnappings happened two hundred years before. Some years it was two boys taken, some years two girls, sometimes one of each. But if at first the choices seemed random, soon the pattern became clear. One was always beautiful and good, the child every parent wanted as their own. The other was homely and odd, an outcast from birth. An opposing pair, plucked from youth and spirited away.
This year, best friends Sophie and Agatha are about to discover where all the lost children go: the fabled School for Good & Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. As the most beautiful girl in Gavaldon, Sophie has dreamed of being kidnapped into an enchanted world her whole life. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, she knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil.
But when the two girls are swept into the Endless Woods, they find their fortunes reversed—Sophie’s dumped in the School for Evil to take Uglification, Death Curses, and Henchmen Training, while Agatha finds herself in the School For Good, thrust amongst handsome princes and fair maidens for classes in Princess Etiquette and Animal Communication.. But what if the mistake is actually the first clue to discovering who Sophie and Agatha really are…?
The School for Good & Evil is an epic journey into a dazzling new world, where the only way out of a fairy tale is to live through one.
Thoughts: I don't even know. What do I think about this book. There were times when I was left shaking my head and wondering why on earth I was reading it and then times when I actually laughed along with the characters antics. (Sigh) Well, let me try and get my thoughts straight.
The fascinating cover, a story about friends, two fairytale schools...it all sounded captivating and though I try to be wary of popular fiction (its almost all love triangles and guys who are jerks) I admit to being a sucker for great covers despite the proverbial saying "Don't judge a book by it's cover". Needless to say this was actually, more or less, what I expected it to be rather than what I hoped; a high school drama about two girls and one boy with fairytale elements. But that wasn't all (otherwise I'm not sure I could have finished reading it). There was also a bigger question looming in the back: what makes someone good or evil? And can someone truly be only good or only evil, with no in between? This is probably one of the few books I read for the plot which was actually pretty intriguing. Intertwining so many new ideas and possibilities it left its rather typical characters behind. Well written but with randomly interspersed crude humor its a little hard to stick with but...well, I think I sort of liked it, I'm waiting to pass further judgement once I've read the rest of the series. After all, if the plot is nearly the same and the girls are simply going to go back and forth with their roles I'm going to get fed up pretty fast. But then again, the plot was one of the best aspects of the story so I suppose I should have some faith in the Author and hope he'll be able to catch more of my interest as the books continue.
Content: Again, crude humor and the toss up for what's good and what's evil but clean aside from that.
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