Acquired Book By: I had to take a leave of absence hosting for this touring company in [2015] whilst I worked towards finding better balance in my blogging and personal life. I returnt to hosting for Lola’s Book Tours in [2018] before having to take a small hiatus from requesting future blog tours for a second time. By [2020] as my health afflictions from 2018/19 started to recede I realised I could start to host for her authors with better confidence in being able to participate on the tours themselves. I am thankful I can continue to host and feature tours by this touring company from 2020-forward.
I received a complimentary bound manuscript ARC copy of “Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code” direct from the author Emma Jean in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.
Hallo, Hallo dear hearts!
I will admit, I saw this week going differently than it had – who would have suspected that my rescheduled tour date for this lovely blog tour (shifted from Monday to Friday) would have been further stalled out my even more intensive storms than the weekend prior? I also lost ALL internet connectivity and had to have a full system replacement (blessedly, courtesy of my provider – who even wants to contemplate what that would have cost?) but it robbed me of all the hours I have to read and blog. Not to mention, I logged on early this Friday morning to get a jump-start on my post and to see if I could make further headway than I had – only to have my computer slam me into a locked out state of updates itself! (angry smirks)
I decided to keep this as a reduced review – to where I talk about what I’ve found inside the first twenty-five pages of the story, my thoughts on the characters and how the story is being presented thus far along. I work a lot of double shifts and with the compounded angst of weather & storms (which yes is par usual for Summers in my region) it is further difficult as I’m not generally out in them whilst working — however, you could say, this year has been a year of changes and that has been a bit of a challenge in of itself to work through. I miss reading and just having downtime to listen to Spotify and/or queue up an audiobook. This week was exhausting because I didn’t have a way to unwind after work and the long shifts – whilst wondering if any trees would be spared due to the heaviness of the lightning. The kind that makes you jump even as an adult because its such a strong force of natural phenom crackling right outside your windows!
I pray all is well elsewhere where you all are reading yourselves – where weather and climate isn’t putting a wench into your plans and you’ve been able to soak into some wicked good stories! One note of awesomeness is the beautiful LARGE manuscript ARC I received for this blog tour! I always have to get used to double spaced manuscripts – as I personally don’t use that format as a writer, as it messes with my line reads and eyes a bit — however, the font was graciously large and the book itself was such a delight to have to read as I felt it was a kind transition for a work weary reader such as myself!! This is similar to why I enjoy reading Harlequin Heartwarming in large print as well — sometimes a girl needs a gentle way to ease back into her stories!
Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code
by Emma Jean
Source: Author via Lola's Blog Tours
Sleeping Beauty's thirteenth birthday looms on the horizon as she and her friends hole up in the cursed princess lab, determined to prove that science and technology can defeat dark magic and save the kingdom from 100 years of cursed sleep.
Places to find the book:
ISBN: 979-8510604207
Published by 4Pigs2Fly
on 26th May, 2021
Format: Bound Manuscript (ARC)
Pages: 285
Published by: 4Pigs2Fly
Converse on Twitter via: #STEM #FairyTale
as well as #SleepingBeauty Retelling and #EmmaJean
| Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code | by Emma Jean
Why I wanted to read this story: I have been an appreciator of STEM literature for a number of years now, as I’ve featured STEM stories for different ages of children for different publishers in the past. What I most love about them is that they are celebrating why I, as an adult reader was such a wicked Science geek as a kid! I hung out at my local Science Center every Summer – taking so many classes & field trips – it was hard not to ache after Summer after every school term! Of course, then they had to monk round with the requirements and nowadays a lot of the courses I took are now locked out to everyday learners and Science geeks like I had been because you now have to prove yourself with entry tests, course requirements and for some odd reason they made it key into your school transcripts. I much prefer the yesteryear approach of where learning was open & available for all students & learners alike – where you didn’t have to ‘prove’ why Science was your thing – it simply was.
Thereby, whenever I see a creative way to have either STEM or STEAM topics & subjects explored in literature, I like to be an involved party to help shine a light on these stories and on the writers behind them. I will always champion all-access learning portals and this is one reason I’m a lifetime library learner & reader, too.
When I first started reading the story, I was having a hard shift to wrap my head round the characters and the setting of the novel – I understood, as a fairy-tale retelling this was going to have a fairy-tale component of interest, but it was different seeing how Jean respun the presence of Cinderella & Sleeping Beauty into the heart of her novel. Meanwhile the presence of the twins threw me off completely – whilst the cover art was also a bit confusing for me at first – as I was trying to sort out who was whom and of course, what the VR gear would imply for the gist of the plot that was meant to unfold as I knew this story involved coding and technology. You can see that hinted through the code behind the title on the front cover.
One thing was sure – this was a different kind of story altogether – where the fey are not necessary good-natured towards the characters and where their intentions are entirely their own. Which is of their nature, and inclusive of the stories I’ve been reading as an adult Speculative Fiction reader who devours Urban Fantasy stories (such as the Tipsy Fairy Tale series and/or the October Daye series) In this world, you can find intensive nightmaric cursed dreamscrapes – wherein one of the characters has a foretelling of their curse and the effects of what it could involve through seeing a premonition of sorts of what has happened previously. It is part flashback and part precognitive warning – all played out whilst a person is asleep!
From there, Jean talks to us about how in this world, the Evil Fairy holds all the cards (at least in the beginning) to where she believes she’s creating the chaos only she can dispel or outright control. She only wants to curse people in a way that she feels is both fitting and heart-wrenching to that person – whilst owning the fact her curse has a path laid down in front of them they must walk and accept. This world has its fair share of naughty fey – where their actions and their conscience ring true of the Unseelie Court and of how sometimes the fey wig you out for how obtuse they can be in regards to not having common courtesy and decency in their manners or how they appear to only care about their own affairs or finding the best way to deceive. Their tricksters by nature and yet, there is more to how they operate than that as well.
Woz is one of the good fey – I’d equate her to the Seelie Court – where her heart is anchoured to her charge (in this instance, Sleeping Beauty). She was there the day Sleeping Beauty was first blessed with charms (by other fairies) and cursed; but it didn’t defer her own actions to ensure Sleeping Beauty had a chance to re-take her own life and erase the curse she was burdened with so very young. Jean also showed how the fey can manipulate others – by action or decree and by how whenever that Evil one is round, no one is honestly safe from her wrath.
By the time I reached the first bit of Chapter 3 – where my preview read of this story concluded, I recognised now what is on the front cover – Sleeping Beauty’s first meeting of Snow White! Their in the Cursed Princess Lab – where all the princesses who have been cursed are gathered – using their knowledge and their powers of deductive reasoning to root out a way to overtake the Evil Fairy’s plans for them all. It was there where we left a younger Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella – as she was eight when she first met Cinderella, and now, all these years forward, she’s on the fringes of turning fourteen.
Apparently, in this realm – the only solutions lie in Science and Code – where you have to not just outthink your opponent but you have to outsmart them. Similar to the surprise gift Woz gave a young Sleeping Beauty which re-set the timeclock against her and the re-meeting the Evil Fairy. It would be keen to see where Jean takes the story next – how she handles the coding and the Princess Lab whilst owning to the other sections of the world as well. Such as how Sleeping Beauty’s father isn’t the sharpest of fathers but how her mother is not only all-knowing but she is fierce character of her own. I knew there was more coming for her and Sleeping Beauty – as Jean only just starts to set the stage for us in the first few chapters.
I only had one issue that was not explained properly for me – why are ‘splinters’ a concern for Sleeping Beauty and the others who are round her? We only briefly saw the twins: June and April – they were two diverse characters in the storyline – one even sported non-conventional haircut which I felt was wicked brilliant! I’ll let you enjoy the surprise when you meet April for yourself. She seemed like a delightful addition, to me! I was curious – are splinters meaning a splint in time, in person or in actual, you know wood splinters? Was it a way to see a person start to fracture under a curse or become altered by the curse itself? I wish there had been more backstory on that – as all we had to go on in the opening chapters was they were needed to be searched for but no one explained what ‘splinters’ were exactly as it pertains to this story.
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{Sources: Book Cover for “Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code”, synopsis of “Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code”, author biography and photograph (of Emma Jean), the extract from “Sleeping Beauty and the Cursed Code”, blog tour banner and host badge were provided by Lola’s Blog Tours and are being used with permission. Post dividers by Fun Stuff for Your Blog via Pure Imagination. Tweets were embedded due to codes provided by Twitter. Blog graphics created by Jorie via Canva: Stories in the Spotlight banner, #25PagePreview banner as well as the Comment Box Banner.}
Copyright © Jorie Loves A Story, 2021.
I am socially bookish and tweet my readerly life
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✨feat. #SleepingBeauty & the Cursed Code
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— Jorie Story 📖🎧 (@joriestory) June 18, 2021
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