This may be the best fairytale retelling I've ever read. Girls Made of Snow and Glass is a retelling of Snow White, told from both "snow white" and the stepmother's points of view, and it is fantastic.

First, there's Lynet. The Snow White character in the story, she feels stifled by her overprotective father and would rather climb trees and scale the castle walls than be quiet and demure (like her mother), the way her father wants her to be. She loves her father, but she also wants to be her own person, free from the shadow of the dead queen. She has an internal struggle between who she wants to be and who other people want her to be (which I found very relatable), and in the end she's strong and courageous enough to make her own way in the world. I loved her.

Then there's Mina, who, despite being the stepmother of the story, is far from evil. She was actually a very sympathetic character who knows she's broken because she can't love (and, she thinks, can't be loved). I honestly didn't root for Lynet to beat Mina because I cared about Mina, too. I wanted them both to win somehow.

If there's a villain in this story at all, it's Mina's father, the magician Gregory. He's cruel and cunning and selfish, and he has dark plans for Lynet that don't get revealed until towards the end. He's not even in most of the book, but his shadow hovers over Mina and she's (rightfully) afraid of him.

The story alternates perspectives between Lynet and Mina. You get to see how Mina came to marry Lynet's father and how having a glass heart incapable of love affected her life. You also get Lynet's struggle between her love for her father and wanting to be who he wants her to be, and her desire to be her own independent person. Then circumstances cause the two women to clash. And while ostensibly the plot is about this clash between Mina and Lynet, with a little bit of politics and magic, it's really more about the characters. How they're feeling, how they think, how they react. Mina and Lynet are excellently written, and reading about their emotional journeys was fantastic.

And probably the best part - it has a happy ending!

Of course, the book isn't perfect. Mainly when it came to the romance. I can't even say that Lynet falls in love with someone, because the romance doesn't get enough time or attention for that to really be shown. She likes this person and they kiss towards the end, so there's definitely some romance going forward after the end of the book, but it was really sidelined during the main story and the love interest isn't even in most of the book. I liked the romance, it was cute and I think it was a good way of showing Lynet growing up, but removing it would hardly have affected the story at all.

This book is amazing. It's one of the best books I've read in a while, and probably one of the best fairytale retellings I've ever read. I loved how it was character-driven while still being a fantasy story and not neglecting either element. I enthusiastically recommend this book.