A Mirror Mended

Fractured Fables

By: Alix E. Harrow

Narrated by: Amy Landon

A Mirror Mended is the next installment in USA Today best-selling author Alix E. Harrow's Fractured Fables series!

Zinnia Gray, professional fairy-tale fixer and lapsed Sleeping Beauty is over rescuing snoring princesses. Once you’ve rescued a dozen damsels and burned 50 spindles, once you’ve gotten drunk with 20 good fairies and made out with one too many members of the royal family, you start to wish some of these girls would just get a grip and try solving their own narrative issues.

Just when Zinnia’s beginning to think she can't handle one more princess, she glances into a mirror and sees another face looking back at her: the shockingly gorgeous face of evil, asking for her help. Because there’s more than one person trapped in a story they didn’t choose. Snow White's Evil Queen has found out how her story ends and she's desperate for a better ending. She wants Zinnia to help her before it’s too late for everyone. Will Zinnia accept the Queen's poisonous request, and save them both from the hot iron shoes that wait for them, or will she try another path?

A Macmillan Audio production from Tor.com Imprint.

©2022 Alix E. Harrow (P)2022 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

A Goodreads Most Anticipated Summer Read!

A Paste Magazine Best New Fantasy of 2022!

“A lively, engaging fairy-tale retelling perfect for devouring in a single sitting.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Series fans and lovers of fractured fairy tales will find plenty to hold their attention.” —Publishers Weekly

“Readers who love stories that twist narratives into knots will fall for Harrow’s fractured fairy tale” —Library Journal

Not bad, not great, simple and sweet

The title of my review pretty much says it all on how I felt about this story. I am certain there are folks who will find it very moving,.. just not me. I have, nonetheless, no regrets for having read it.

There was one line near the end that caught me off guard as it displayed a basic human truth so many people haven’t yet figured out. The essence of it was that the opposite of pity is compassion. Way too many people confuse these two as synonyms.

A perfect ending

I love Harrow’s writing. It’s beautiful, and A Mirror Mended is no exception. I loved A Spindle Splintered, so I was excited to get more of Zinnia’s story. Funny and heartfelt, this little duet of novellas has my heart. I wasn’t ready for her story to end, but if it had to- I’m glad it ended this way.

So fun and heartfelt

I love this conclusion to the story! It was funny and heartfelt, addressing mortality and the importance of how you live your life in all the funny/scary/beautiful worlds.
The narrator does such a good job with the humor and all of the characters’ voices. It was impressive she had such a wide range for almost an entirely female group of characters. Definitely recommend!

Fantastically LGBTQ+ & funny

A Mirror Mended is the sequel to the acclaimed novel, A Spindle Splintered, by award-winning author Alix E. Harrow. In the first book of the Fractured Fables series, we meet Zinnia Gray, the modern-day Sleeping Beauty. Destined to die before her twenty-first birthday, Zin has always led a life in fast-forward, graduating high school two years early and earning her college degree in only seven semesters. On her 21st birthday she deliberately pricks her finger on the used spinning wheel and discovers she has the ability to travel among the multiverses to meet – and save – other doomed sleeping beauties. Along the way, the rare disorder that will eventually kill her has been reset, giving her more time to live – and to rescue damsels in distress.

Fast forward to five years, where Zinnia Gray has been “adventuring through the multiverse” and saving sleeping beauties – 49 of them, to be precise! The “dimension-hopping, damsel-saving badass” is always running from one universe to the next, always running into trouble to save someone else while fiercely ignoring her own life – and looming death.

After one more wedding celebration, Zinnia prepares to find yet another princess to save when she looks into a mirror and sees someone else’s face. The stranger asks for help, and Zinnia is pulled through the mirror into a different type of story. Snow White’s evil queen wants to know how Zinna travels dimensions. She’s determined to escape her fate, and forces Zin through the mirror, across the multiverse, into a completely different set of rules. Neither a kiss not a prick of her finger will send Zin home, so she’s stuck helping the evil queen.

Zin is still fiercely snarky, but her mind is more open to the physics- or lack of – in the various worlds she falls into. She still hopes to find a better once upon a time, but is determined not to sit around and wait for it to come to her. Instead, she charges willingly into danger, hoping to save everyone else along the way.

Fantastically LGBTQ+ and funny, A Mirror Mended is another must-read. Like A Spindle Splintered, the audiobook is also narrated by the talented Amy Landon, who brings Zinnia Gray and her companions to life. I highly recommend both books.

Eh.

Wasn’t jazzed with how unlikable & uncomfortable the protagonist became. She was slightly annoying in the first installment and even more so in the second. I enjoyed the fantasy aspects of the novel, but I was definitely divested in the protag’s story arc this time around.

A happy conclusion

Not a happily, not really but a filling and happy conclusion to this duology. We see a lot of character growth in our heroine and I love it

A fun Continuation

A fun continuation from a spindle splintered. My only gripe is how short these Novellas are! I always want more.

A great ending

I wanted to read this conclusion for two weeks now. I’m so glad I’m finally done with this story. The beginning isn’t nearly so exciting as the first book and the pacing isn’t great. I was honestly finding the book quite dull and lacking until the middle point. There are lots of great discussion topics and Harrow has a great writing style. This book feels at times like a repetition of Ten Thousand Doors of January, with a slightly robotic narrator and a more skeptical and sarcastic tone. Also, the gay romance… I preferred the gay romance of the first book. A good book.

Defies expectations and offers reading satisfaction plus personal meaning

I just live Harrow’s writing. She has a way of impeccably combining compelling characters, unpredictable plots, age-old archetypes and a very personal and poignant search for meaning in the modern world - all with skillful writing. ‘Mirror Mended’ was no exception. I was sad when Zinnia’s story ended - though we know all stories must end.