Disney Book Review: Mother Knows Best

Mother Knows Best: A Tale of the Old Witch by Serena Valentino is the latest title in a young adult book series about Disney villains. There are five books in total, including The Beast Within, which I read and reviewed last year. For Mother Knows Best, Valentino turns her attention to Gothel, the youth-obsessed witch that kidnaps Rapunzel and keeps her locked away in a tower in Disney’s Tangled. 

I feel a little locked up myself these days, after numerous school cancellations this week. I’ve even wrestled with my own thoughts of “mother knows best” while trying to maintain harmony at home. Of course, that’s where the similarities end.

I can’t sing that well and I’m clearly aging.

Today’s post shares a spoiler-free review of Mother Knows Best.

Likes

Let’s start with the good stuff.

I love the book’s compact size. It’s smaller than most books (roughly 6″x7″) which somehow makes it more fitting for a fairy tale. The size of the book, along with the fact that it was written for young adults, also makes the 390 pages fly by quickly.

It also has an awesome cover. All of the books in Valentino’s series sport dramatic images of their respective Disney villains.  On the hard copy of Mother Knows Best, there’s a young Gothel on the outer dust jacket and an older, creepier Gothel hiding underneath on the actual book. It’s a great detail that cleverly supports the storyline.

Ringing endorsement so far right? I like the book’s small size, readability and cover!

Fortunately, there are a few things I liked about the actual story too.

For starters, the book shares a bit more about Gothel’s upbringing. Disney’s Tangled doesn’t reveal too much about this mysterious villain. You may not have even caught her name, since it’s only mentioned briefly in the film’s opening narration. In Mother Knows Best we learn about Gothel’s mother, sisters and childhood home within the dead forest. We also learn a little more about the magical flower and why Gothel doesn’t really have any powers on her own.

Secondly, the story provides the opportunity to revisit some scenes from Disney’s Tangled. There are references to the Snuggly Duckling, the floating lanterns and Rapunzel’s useful frying pan. Valentino even weaves in some of the direct dialogue and lyrics from the film, including a few bars from the song that serves as her book’s title. (Listen to your Moth-er!)

The scenes are brief and some die-hard Tangled fans may not like the details surrounding the events, but at least the major story elements remain in place. Just note that Rapunzel doesn’t show up in the story until the closing chapters, so her role in the overall book is a fairly minor one. 

Dislikes

Unfortunately, there are quite a few things I didn’t like about the book too.

For starters, Gothel’s storyline is pretty dark. There are tons of references to blood, skeletons and death with detailed descriptions of each. It’s not as bad as a horror film or anything, but it’s definitely darker (killing children, drinking blood, references to decapitated heads in jars…) than I was expecting for a book published by Disney for younger readers.

The younger reader distinction caused me some issues too, although granted I’m a smidge (decades?) past the targeted age range. The writing is over simplified at times and incredibly repetitive at others. (Give younger readers some credit!) I did learn one new vocabulary word though. It’s necromancy, which refers to communing with the dead.

Perhaps not all that useful in daily conversation, but there you go. 

Bonus points if you can work it into a sentence this week.

The main thing I didn’t like about Valentino’s latest book is the amount of time she spends on additional characters. The three sister witches that appear in all of Valentino’s books arrive around page 140 in Mother Knows Best and stick around for the duration of the story.  I suppose they are included to bring some continuity to the overall series, but I found their impact on the plot distracting and a little forced at times. For example, the sisters describe all of the actions of Rapunzel at the end of the book rather than Gothel. It felt like a missed opportunity to better understand Gothel’s point of view.

Some of the other new characters in Valentino’s version also carry ridiculous names. There’s a nurse named Mrs. Pickle and a maid named Mrs. Tiddlebottom. The silliness of their names just didn’t seem to work against this dark backdrop, at least from my perspective. 

One final issue, perhaps because I was already annoyed by the three witches, was their tendency to poke fun at fairy tales. They complain about aggressive princes kissing princesses while they sleep and other princesses falling in love with the first prince they see. I usually (always?!?) appreciate sarcasm, and enjoyed it by Gothel in the film version, but it just didn’t work for me here. 

Summary

If you couldn’t tell, Mother Knows Best wasn’t my favorite Disney experience. I liked the size of the book, the interesting cover and the quick peek into Gothel’s background, but the darkness of the story and the addition of so many new, and often unlikeable characters, left a negative impression overall.

Perhaps you’d feel differently. If you want to give Valentino’s series a try, I would recommend trying one of her other titles first (Beast?). 

Earlier this year I suggested you could also wait to watch a new series based on Valentino’s books entitled Book of Enchantments that was under development for Disney+. That project was abandoned in late August 2019, so that option is no longer available. Apparently Disney thought the series was “too dark” for their family-friendly streaming service.

Guess I wasn’t too far off on my book review?

For me, reading Mother Knows Best mostly just made me want to watch Tangled again.

In fact, I think I will right now.

Add a little magic to your world!