Books like Cinder and Ella

This book was... weird. I still can't make up my mind whether it's meant to be an MG-level read, or YA. The writing style is all mixed up, part traditional bardic narration and part simplified children's narrative. For example:The end result was havoc in the place of happiness. Contention was now a constant guest in the house and the occasional, small quarrels between the sisters turned to fits of rage. They would often say nasty things to each other, hurt each other, or simply not speak to one another for weeks at a time. One day, one of the daughters was about to cut a cake for somebody's birthday. The older sister was relentlessly throwing a tantrum because she wanted to cut the cake. So the third daughter grabbed a handful of the cake and smeared it into the hair of her older sister. The eldest daughter slapped her very hard across the face and the third daughter ran to her room, her cheek stinging and red. After this happened, the mother announced that birthdays would no longer be celebrated in the house. *The idea behind the novel is interesting, but the execution is severely lacking. Cinder and Ella, along with their parents and two sisters live happily in the village of Willow Top. Until the evil Prince comes to visit them one night and sows poisonous seeds in the father's mind. Soon their father becomes discontented and eventually leaves the house. Their mother, devastated by her husband's abandonment, retreats to her spinning wheel, leaving her daughters to fend for themselves. The eldest and youngest children turn into indulgent twats, and the burden of caring for them falls onto the middle siblings Conder and Ella. But when Cinder gets a job at the palace as a maid, she becomes involved in magical intrigue involving the evil prince, and also manages to pull her sister Ella into it. Along the way, the two sisters find love, adventure and betrayal. I've written three full-length reviews today, and I'm running out of steam, so I'm going to finish this up quickly. The characterizations in this book are flat, to say the least. I never really got an idea of who the main characters were. The author told more than she showed. Some things were just outright ludicrous. For example, the prince wreaks havoc across the kingdom while the king sits in his room and watches. He never interferes until things get dire, and the prince is finally banished from the kingdom for hurting Cinder and Ella, but while the prince is stealing souls and enslaving his subjects, the king just sits back benignly and watches. Why is he king, again?The story is allegorical, I get that (and if I didn't there is a list of 'questions to think about' at the end that point me in that direction!) but the allegory is handled clumsily. The fact that this story has underlying messages doesn't mean you can skimp out on the actual storytelling and characterization. This book wasn't boring, exactly, but it wasn't anything to write home about either. Meh describes it best. It is nowhere near sophisticated enough for a YA read, and not interesting enough to appeal to MG readers. I would suggest that anyone looking for a fanciful fairy tale of this sort try Gail Carson Levine. Her books are charming and well-written and have great characters!* Quotes are from an ARC and will be verified against a published copy.An ARC was provided to me for review purposes by the publishers via Net Galley.