Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce

I was very, very excited to read Sisters Red, by Jackson Pearce. One of my favorite books from growing up was Ella Enchanted, by Gail Carson Levine, and ever since then, I’ve become fond of fairy-tale retellings, which flesh-out and humanize characters in ways more suited to a novel-length.

I was excited to see a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood. There are a lot of Cinderella, Snow White, and even mermaid stories out there, but you don’t see this story as much. Plus, it looked like Jackson Pearce had an original take on an old story. Two Red Riding Hoods, who are sisters? Buffy-style fighters against werewolves who prey on young women? The idea alone has a lot going for it. For the most part, the book lived up to my expectations.

Things I liked

Jackson Pearce’s fantasy world. Pearce brings the story easily into a contemporary setting: where werewolves stalk cities at night for girls walking alone. Contemporary fantasy is a good fit for Red Riding Hood, and Pearce takes advantage of that. The fact that the girls learn about life through stories that their grandmother told them is a nice touch, too.

Things I Didn’t Like

The point-of-view balance didn’t quite work. (Here be some minor, minor spoilers.) The story opens with a third-person prologue that is written beautifully, bringing in the language of old fairy tales and structured like a short-story. But from then on, the story is told in alternating first-person narratives between Scarlett and Rosie. Then, the epilogue switches back to third person. It isn’t the point-of-view switching around that’s the problem: in fact, it kind of works in a symbolic way, since the story is partially about the sisters discovering their own selves outside of each other, only to become reacquainted with their new, “adult” selves once they’ve grown a bit. The problem is that the author didn’t seem like she was always aware of her reasons for choosing first person. For example, a moment in Scarlett’s opening narration bothered me. A boy who Scarlett knows very well enters the narrative, yet she, in her narration, doesn’t call him by name until after saying his name out loud. She just refers to him as “the boy” and such until that point. I couldn’t figure any narrative purpose, and it kind of just felt like the author forgot she wasn’t still in third person.

Things I Liked

Beautiful moments of prose bloom in many parts of this book, often doing an excellent job of orienting readers in the setting and allowing insight into the character who is speaking. For example Scarlett states on page 108 in her narration:

“They’re adorned in glittery green rhinestones, shimmery turquoise and aquamarine powders streaked across their eyelids. Dragonfly girls. Their hair is all the same, long and streaked, spiraling down their backs to where the tiny strings holding their tops on are knotted tightly. Their skin glows under the neon lights—amber, ebony, cream—like shined metal, flawless and smooth. I press harder against the crumbly brick wall behind me, tugging my crimson cloak closer to my body. The scars on my shoulders show through the fabric when I pull the cloak tight. Bumpy red hills in perfectly spaced lines.”

Don’t you just want to close-read that? Or maybe it’s just me--English major moment!

Still, that kind of writing is a pleasure to read and I'm sure many readers will love it.

Things I Didn’t Like

Excessive dialogue tagging. This might be a personal pet-peeve on my part, but it's a big one. If the dialogue is doing it’s job, then the author shouldn't have to explain the feeling of it in tags. To do so just feels redundant. This is a little bit of a problem in this book. Here are some examples from the text, just a few I found from opening to a random page in the middle:

He says, pointedly.

I grin, relieved.

Silas answers firmly.

I grumble.

Silas says seriously.

It could have just been “I say” or “He says.”

Here’s an example of a redundancy in a dialogue tag: “'You tell the Alpha that, then,’ the second Fenris growls, in a voice hardly human.”

Obviously it’s not human. It’s a growl.

This sounds nitpicky, but it’s distracting from a really creative and cool story, and honestly, it should have been an easy fix. An editor should have caught this stuff and taken it out before the book went to publication.

Unless they WANTED the book to sound redundant because they underestimated their teen readers' ability to recognize subtlety. Personally I think that's a big mistake, since it turns off the smartest and most perceptive of teen readers, the ones who read everything and make recommendations to their friends.

Things I liked (Bonus)

What a beautiful cover! There is so much story in the cover alone, and it makes you really want to read the book. I also appreciated the handwriting-ish chapter titles, and the symbols that began each sister’s chapter: a leaf for Scarlett, and a flower for Rosie.

Conclusion

This book tells a compelling story, with some minor text issues that, unfortunately, might turn some readers away. The plot is only a little predictable, but there are a lot of great moments of story between the beginning and the end that it almost doesn’t matter. If you’re already a fan of YA fantasy, you’ll probably like this one. I’d even go as far as to say it’s better than average. If you’re a fan of fairytale retellings in novel form, then I’d definitely recommend it, since it is such a creative take and LRRH is such a staple. But if you’re not really into either of these things, then I don’t expect this to be the book to turn you onto the genre, especially if excessive dialogue tagging in fiction annoys you.

Extra

I was so excited about the cover of this book that I chose to use it as an example of strategic color use for the tumblog I am currently running for my graphic design class. If you're interested in reading a more detailed analysis of the cover color use, check it out here.