Cinder & Ella-- Kelly Oram

I have read most of Kelly Oram’s book and I am intent to read more after I post this review. Her stories are not the most complex but boy, do they draw you in. Cinder & Ella is exactly what you would think with a title like that--a revamped version of Cinderella.

It’s been almost a year since eighteen-year-old Ella Rodriguez was in a car accident that left her crippled, scarred, and without a mother. After a very difficult recovery, she’s been uprooted across the country and forced into the custody of a father that abandoned her when she was a young child. If Ella wants to escape her father’s home and her awful new stepfamily, she must convince her doctors that she’s capable, both physically and emotionally, of living on her own. The problem is, she’s not ready yet. The only way she can think of to start healing is by reconnecting with the one person left in the world who’s ever meant anything to her—her anonymous Internet best friend, Cinder.

Hollywood sensation Brian Oliver has a reputation for being trouble. There’s major buzz around his performance in his upcoming film The Druid Prince, but his management team says he won’t make the transition from teen heartthrob to serious A-list actor unless he can prove he’s left his wild days behind and become a mature adult. In order to douse the flames on Brian’s bad-boy reputation, his management stages a fake engagement for him to his co-star Kaylee. Brian isn’t thrilled with the arrangement—or his fake fiancée—but decides he’ll suffer through it if it means he’ll get an Oscar nomination. Then a surprise email from an old Internet friend changes everything.

Sound familiar? What you don’t see in the synopsis is how she relies so heavily on her relationship with Cinder, that even to her, her disability gets in the way. She is barely a year out of recovery, which to me makes some of the story not as believable and I will get to that later. When Cinder's identity is revealed she is crushed, if he was just some rich kid then it would have been no big deal. They would have been out of the spot light, but Hollywood's rising star was sure to be see. Her self-esteem is at an all time low and she can't even fathom what people would say about her if they give celebrities a hard time about their noses.To her, it's not logical. To him, it is a necessity.

Now back to her recovery: she had 70% of her body burned in either 2^nd or 3^rd degree burns, so much so that her toes are disfigured. She spent 8 months in the hospital and had thirty-some odd surgeries. I just don’t feel like she would ready to be out in the world. Now while I will nit-pick on this fact now, it doesn’t bug me one bit while I am reading.

I love the relationship that Cinder and Ella had and how easily they pick it back up. I love how Brian/Cinder is so concerned with Ella’s health and her well-being. He is so in love with her that he will be her rock. Their witty banter is amazing to read, you can just hear them bickering in the most loving way. I picture it, similarly to the way that my husband and I tease one another. Enough to annoy the crap out of each other but not enough to really piss the off--most of the time.

Now as for the other relationships, that’s where my dilemmas begin. Her dad is an idiot, genuine idiot. Why does he think bringing his 18 year old daughter, who he hasn’t seen in 10 years, will be a seem less transition? This doesn’t even include the fact that his wife and step-daughter are the family her left her for…yet he acts affronted when she calls him out for things. Now his wife is sharing a spot with him on the idiot train. She tries to help but she is completely lacking tact and is basically the least couth person there. I feel like she forget that not only Ella is scarred, living in a new place with new people, living every day in pain, but that she also lost her mother not even a year ago. Seriously, Jennifer?! What the heck?!

Now to the evil step-sisters, I feel like they are completely over the top. Anastasia was the culprit for most of the absurdity, but Juliette in the beginning was a bit much, too. Granted I have never had step-sisters, evil or otherwise, so maybe it is a more normal thing for newly made step-families. Some things pulled away from my general enjoyment of the book, but not enough to make the rating a 3.

It’s a solid 3.5 leaning more towards 4, because I am a sucker for a happily ever after and a sappy romance.