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They were all a little mad, if one was to be forthright.

BUDDY READ WITH SUNNY, MY FAVORITE CHILD.

Okay so, it's a big surprise I enjoyed this. I knew I would simply because it's Marissa Meyer and she did not disappoint me with her Lunar Chronicles series, so I knew this would happen. Marissa is the only author that is able to write novels that captivate me from the very first sentence. To be honest, I dislike retellings a lot. I won't say I hate them, but we aren't very good friends. Every retelling I read (or try to read) ends up unfinished or rated lowly. Marissa Meyer had me intrigued since the very beginning and I couldn't be happier. Heartless was happy and cute, but it was also heartbreaking and now I am heartless? I would say that's the word since I don't even know what my hearts for now.

Heartless is a well-done and well-written retelling of Alice in Wonderland. I've also never been the biggest fan of Alice in Wonderland, so I was a little afraid going into this one when Sana asked me if I wanted to BR it with her. I said yes because I kinda thought she and I would think the same about it and well, I was glad, and I couldn't be happier of us Sana. Our buddy read finally worked! The Queen of Hearts was actually one of my favorite characters only because she was a bitch and had a rude attitude. Call me a bitch as well, but I liked her personality. For some reason, I did, but mainly because she's the Queen of Hearts that everyone else despised while I enjoyed her.

Before becoming the rude Queen, Catherine 'Cath' Pinkerton was just a normal girl who wanted to be happy by opening her own bakery with one of her good friends, Mary-Ann, and she wanted to fall in love, to be happy, to know what's it like to be in love. Before turning into the Queen of Hearts and marrying the infamous King of Hearts, Cath just wanted her own fairytale of falling in love and feeling passion, to be happy while she lived the young life she had. Her parents, being the strict parents that don't really care what happiness for their daughter is and what it really means, don't want her to do that and don't approve of it. Instead, they try pushing her into becoming the only girl that can be seen at a royal ball where the King himself can fall in love with her and propose to her, and that is exactly what happens. The King of Hearts, an immature and childish boy who does not have the capability of ruling a kingdom, proposes to Catherine. He does not show any love and affection towards her in any way but he does show it to her pastries and desserts, which might be why he proposes to her.

Cath, feeling a disgusted pleasure, does not want to accept this proposal and marry the King. Luckily for her, on the same day, a mysterious and new court joker who goes by the name of Jest, arrives on the same day and steals a glance at Cath, not bothering to care about the interruption he just made. As Jest entered the ball and was able to talk to Cath in a way, the two start seeing each other more and all that leads to their own private courtship that is both loving but endangering to both, especially Cath.

So to say it all, I loved Heartless! I really don't care what other have to say about this. I think I loved it so much because it was a retelling of the Queen of Hearts and not about Alice. What made me love this more was that Marissa included so many characters and aspects of the original retelling. We get the Cheshire Cat, Jack 'The Knave of Hearts,' the Caterpillar, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, and other characters that were invented by Marissa. So I know the Red Queen and the Queen of hearts are different characters, but the White Queen and Red Queen were mentioned in this novel by Jest which was something that brought back memories from the movie as well. So to say it all, there were characters from the movie and the original Disney film. We also get such a different setting in this world. It's the world in Wonderland, but it was in the own creation and words of Marissa. It feels very different reading it when comparing it to the other films since it doesn't have to do much with Alice herself, but I was just glad Marissa was able to top that off as well. She was able to make this her own and unique world of Wonderland and it fit the characters and the story perfectly. Other kingdoms were mentioned as well and it was great finding out new things I actually didn't know about. The writing was also something I completely enjoyed! Like I said, Marissa has been the only author that has been able to captivate me into her new worlds and into her writing without complaints since the beginning. I'm always afraid to read retellings because I always think it will ruin the original fairy tale, but when it comes to Marissa, there's no doubt I'll love it.

Cath was definitely a character I enjoyed reading about. She was a simple and normal girl who wanted to live a life she wanted to live, to choose the path she wanted to choose, not the ones her parents wanted for her. She was good, understanding, lovely, adorable, and just cute! It's a fantasy book, so I can't relate to characters, but Cath was a character I was able to understand from the beginning until the end. She had her own dreams and sometimes just wanted to run away and escape the world she was living in because she felt controlled at times by the King and her parents. She couldn't do everything she pleased or wanted to do, and she had to listen to everyone all the time and deal with it all. She didn't have many friends. In fact, she didn't have anyone to count on, not even Chesire. She couldn't trust herself to tell anyone anything or meet anyone knew and feel like they would become friends because she's never had the heart to do that. I sometimes felt bad for Cath and that is part of why I loved her character. She was just cute, that is all. She was also caring and nice but of course, the teenage girl must become the Queen of Hearts that orders to chop heads off and has everyone hating her.

Another thing I loved about Cath is that she wasn't afraid to find out who this mysterious court joker and what he was up to, Jest. Jest was just wonderful in every way possible. He is another one of those fictional characters that are added to my book boyfriends list along with other girls and other book boyfriends over there who actually have a girlfriend ;) Jest was just the perfect one for Cath. I wouldn't call them boyfriend and girlfriend because their relationship actually started late, but the way their friendship was growing and turning into small aspects of a relationship was cute. Cath admitting to herself that she hated how she was falling for Jest immediately was funny, and of course, a book pet peeve of mine is insta love and I honestly hate it, but insta love here was different and I actually didn't mind it which is not something that usually happens. Never has happened, but with Heartless, history has been made. Cath and Jest both fell for each other and that involved insta love, but I wasn't upset. The only reason I hate it is because the author didn't write it correctly or in a way where I was able to enjoy it. There was no love triangle, and thank you, Marissa, for that, so instead love wasn't a problem. I loved them together since the beginning since Jest started his small performance that left the King and everyone else amazed and surprised and then just, left. Jest was just perfect. The ending doesn't change anything for me and I will love him forever and always. (view spoiler)[Cath may be heartless but just like her, I'm not heartless for Jest. He's there in my heart and I thank him for coming into Cath's life and making it better. (hide spoiler)] He brought her to different worlds. What I mean by that is that he was able to make Cath smile and laugh like no one else and I just loved that. Jest was just amazing in every way and I loved everything about him. He's a mysterious joker, a swoon-worthy male who had me giggling like a small 5-year-old fangirl because I couldn't get enough of him. Sana and I swooned over him since the beginning because he was a mysterious dude and he just sounded like those other attractive fictional characters.

A joker. A rook. A mystery.

Unlike Jest and Cath, the other characters were the pieces of the book that I did not like in any way. Actually, I enjoyed the Raven and Chesire, but that's it. The King was very immature, childish, a fool, and did not have any kind of ability to rule a kingdom. He was a King who was very scared and did not have any protection under him in any way, he did not know how the care for a wife really is, and he couldn't do anything by himself. He and Cath were not meant to be together in any way and it's obvious from the start, which was another thing I was happy about. The other characters, like Jack and The Mad Hatter, were assholes at times as well. Jack, first, was the character I hated the most from the beginning besides the King. He was a selfish guy who didn't care about anyone and anything besides himself and I really hated how he didn't try anything new. The Mad Hatter was a little different than the Hatta we're familiar with. This guy created and gave hats that could turn people into someone else, which is found out as we learn a little more about him. He was also mysterious, like the Joker, and he was also a selfish guy who didn't care much about the outside but only for himself and what he felt on the inside which was something I didn't like as well. Even with the complaints I have with almost every other character, this book was just phenomenal! It was just what I needed; it was just the retelling I needed to read and I couldn't be happier to finally find a fairy tale retelling that made me my little red heart happy and then shattered it, not allowing it to feel anything.

Marissa Meyer is just a wonderful writer and I'm so glad she was able to come up with this and write it the way I was expecting it. I'm really looking forward to her future novels, her upcoming releases, and anything she has in mind. I heard she's into fairy tales a lot so what she will normally write will be retellings and I am just perfectly okay with that. I loved this a lot, just a lot. I'm not in a hangover, but I feel many emotions towards that ending. Those 4 last words, those 2 words that I read over and over again that made me sad over and over again when I knew that would happen. I currently hate Sana for that because she kept telling me she had predictions and theories and me being the person that doesn't predict anything or have any theories because they can ruin the whole story for me, was very very mad at her. I don't ever predict (unless it's so obvious and it's like, right there) because sometimes I feel like I can or will be right and it will just ruin the whole thing for me. There won't be a point in reading the rest of the story if I already know what's gonna happen. Even if I spoiled myself, I would just skip to the end and say I finished it by skimming the last few pages or the rest of pages that were left of the book. I mean, that's happened a lot (when I spoil myself) so it wouldn't matter to me.