Parents' Guide to Never Ever After, Book 1

This first entry in this young adult fantasy series is fun enough to read, but it's also not incredibly original. What's here in Never Ever After is good, but never great. Despite the inspired Chinese and fairy-tale influences, the characters, courts, lands, and magic are shallowly-drawn. The worldbuilding, character development and creativity feel limited. In a completely invented magical fantasy world where anything is possible, there's just not much here that hasn't already been done elsewhere. There's only a couple types of magic and "kinds" of humans (magical or not), one single tiny dragon makes an appearance, and the woman who turns people to stone all seem redundant.

And yet, the story, the central character of Yining, and the underdeveloped character of Jin, do entertain, along with the several mysteries that motivate the reader through the story. In the second half, the pace picks up, and Yining's adventure is finally off and running. The four-act arc might have been better in three acts, as the first act is slow and a bait and switch first implies a Cinderella-type situation with a developing love triangle, only to irretrievably squash that possibility in favor of the well-worn story of a girl with mysterious origins coming into her own, realizing the magic hidden within her, and learning how to use it. Though some readers will prefer this trajectory, it's not treading new ground. But at least once all the fighting is fought and the intrigue sorted, most readers will be invested enough for the next installment.