The ideas were there, but it was missing something in the execution to really connect with me as a reader. The two of them had a lot of potentials to become complex, but I felt that the story fell short for both of them. Both Aurora and Philip share some cute banter, but their dialogue skews toward childish. For me, I would rather have this part of the story expanded and reduced to the beginning.
She does not even meet Phillip until a quarter (or so) of the way through, which is when the story really starts to move forward. The book takes a bit to get started as Aurora is living in the castle with Maleficent. Overall, this novel was not bad, but it was not quite there to make it a hit for me. It made for an interesting take on the original Disney story as the two only met for an extremely short period of time before deciding they were meant to be. As Philip remembers them falling in love at first sight, Aurora is interested in getting to know each other more. This made an interesting dynamic as the two of them try to connect again to their HEA.
As Philip is in Aurora’s dream, he can remember her, but she has no memory of him. The structure of the novel does get confusing in some moments as there are chapters throughout where the setting is in the real world and others where it is the dream world. The concept of the story is interesting as the reader not only gets a deeper exploration into Aurora as a character, but it is unique where the story mixes Aurora’s reality and dream worlds.
When Aurora begins to get glimpses of another life in her mind, she begins to question what is real and what only exists in her mind. She “adopts” Aurora as her aunt and raises her in the castle. Maleficent rescues Aurora from her destructive parents and ends up as Queen. This is the opening chapter of the novel before the main story begins following Aurora when she is younger. In this story, the author twists the story of Disney’s Sleeping Beauty where Prince Phillip ends up asleep after kissing her. Once Upon a Dream is the second novel in the standalone Twisted Tales series.
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