The sequel, The Wicked Remain, was released in November 2022. It follows the same four characters as they continue to investigate the curse.
The Grimrose Girls contains examples of:
- Abusive Parents: The book is based on fairy tales, so of course there are some abusive parents. In particular, Ella’s stepmother is emotionally and physically abusive (even to her stepsisters, on occasion). Ella’s father could also count, as he knew how his fiance was treating his daughter, and he chose to marry her anyway.
- Adaptational Diversity: Many characters in the novel are based on fairy tales; in the original stories these characters are generally assumed (although not always stated) to be white, and they fall in love with and marry someone of the opposite gender. In this series, almost every character is made more diverse in some way: for example, Rory (Sleeping Beauty) is a butch lesbian, and her love interest is woman of color. Nani (Belle from Beauty and the Beast) is half-black and half-Hawaiian, as well as being plus-sized, and her love interest is a transgender woman of color.
- Attack on the Heart: In the final fight, Yuki stabs Fake Penelope in the heart with her own knife.
- Ax-Crazy: Penelope seems normal at first, but in the climax of the novel it’s revealed that she killed at least five people- and considered it fun.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Penelope is introduced as a fairly nice and likable person who truly seems to have Yuki’s best interests at heart. Towards the end of the novel, it becomes increasingly clear that this is not the case.
- Bludgeoned to Death: Micaeli is found with her head bashed in. There is blood. And brains.
- Burial at Sea: It’s not the ocean, but Fake Penelope’s body is disposed of in the frozen-over lake, where it will remain until the thaw.
- Butch Lesbian: Rory goes by a masculine nickname, almost exclusively wears mens clothing, and is quite sporty. She eventually cuts off her hair.
- Cradling Your Kill: When Yuki stabs Penelope, she catches her body and holds her while she dies. This meant less as a comfort, although Yuki did consider her a good friend prior to Penelope’s Evil All Along reveal only minutes before. Mostly, she wanted to be close enough to have a whispered Final Exchange while she still could.
- Disappeared Dad: Nani’s main motivation, before getting involved in curse-related shenanigans, is to look for her father. He has been gone for a long time, first because of his deployment in the Marines and then because of his position at Grimrose Academie. Nani comes to Grimrose because she thinks he will be here, only to discover that he is already gone. Presumably, this plotline will be explored further in subsequent novels. In the second novel, it is revealed that her father has a terminal illness, and didn't want her to see him in his weakened state.
- The Dog Was the Mastermind: The villains turn out to be two random teachers who appeared in very few scenes, were completely unmemorable, and had less than ten lines between the two of them. Talk about it being the person you least suspect- this time it was the characters that many readers seem to have forgotten even existed, on account of how minor and unmemorable their roles were up until the twist ending.
- Do Not Call Me "Paul": Rory’s full name is Aurore, but she hates it and insists on going by Rory instead. Everyone at school seems to respect this, but her parents (and their secretary) do not.
- Everybody Lives: Although a few background characters die, especially in the first novel, the four main characters are all alive and well at the end of the sequel.
- Evil All Along: Penelope, or rather the person pretending to be Penelope.
- "Eureka!" Moment: Three of the four main characters have this moment, separately, within a few hours of each other. All based on different clues. After multiple months of investigating. The fourth character is a little late to the party.
- False Friend: Penelope to Yuki.
- Fauxshadowing: The entirety of the second book sets up Yuki's stepmother, Reyna, who is the story's version of the Evil Queen as the main villain. This was hinted at in the first book as well, although not to the same extent. As it turns out, all of this foreshadowing amounted to nothing; it was designed to be a Red Herring, but the actual ending was so unsatisfactory that it comes across as more of an
Ass Pull instead. - Final Exchange: In the final fight, just after Yuki has stabbed the fake Penelope in the heart and she is bleeding out in her arms.the fake Penelope: [bleeding out] Why?Yuki: You told me to want things. And I wanted you dead.
- Finally Found the Body: After she is killed at the end of the first book and left in the ice-covered lake, the fake Penelope's body is found by police a few months later when the ice melts. In this case, the main characters already knew where the body was, but no one else did.
- The Good Guys Always Win: The main characters manage to not only avert their own bad endings, but also defeat the villains and end the curse, resulting in everyone else being safe as well.
- Go Out with a Smile: Fake Penelope smiles after she has been stabbed, just before passing away. This is in response to Yuki’s final words to her, as seen above.
- He Knows Too Much: Ariane and Micaeli were both killed because they were getting too close to the truth- Ariane because she was actively investigating the book and the curse, and Micaeli because she was Penelope’s roommate and therefore might have seen something she wasn’t supposed to.
- Impersonation-Exclusive Character: In the climax, it is revealed that the real Penelope was killed and replaced by the imposter a year and a half prior, just before Penelope would have arrived at the school.
- Important Haircut: Rory chops off her own long hair with scissors as a way of rejecting her parents’ expectations and embracing her own identity (as a butch lesbian).
- Kill and Replace: The imposter with Penelope, a full year before the book even begins. It’s unclear if the imposter was somehow made to look more like the original via the curse, or if they already had a resemblance. If there is some level of shapeshifting, then it isn’t absolute, because there are still some slight differences in appearance. The second book implies that their resemblance was natural, since the police are able to identify the fake Penelope's body.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: Most of the deaths in the book. How anyone ever believed they were accidents is another question, although perhaps the curse played into it somehow.
- Mask of Sanity: the fake Penelope in book one.
- Meaningful Name: Pretty much all of them.
- Ella = Cinderella, a fairly obvious connection.
- Rory = Aurora = Sleeping Beauty.
- Yuki (which means “snow”) = Snow White. Although the later half of the story suggests that it's less Snow White and more Snow Queen
- The fake Penelope's real name is Livia. Livia means 'envious,' and her main reason for killing and replacing Penelope was jealousy for her wealth and status.
- Secondary and background characters have meaningful names as well, although there are too many to list them all.
- No Name Given: The fake Penelope never gives a real name. They spend most of the book using a name that does not belong to them, and even after this is revealed, other characters continue to refer to them by that false name. Their original name is never revealed. In the second book, her name is posthumously revealed to be Livia Ricci.
- One True Love: Subverted in the case of Ella and Freddie. They're set up as perfect love interests and seem to have a great relationship, and seeing as this is a young adult book about fairy tales, and that they are literally a version of Cinderella and Prince Charming, it seems almost inevitable that they'll end up together forever. Instead, they break up in the final chapters.
- Plot-Triggering Death: The book opens with Ariane’s funeral. Her death is what gets the other characters investigating things.
- Prince Charming: Frederick is literally this for the book’s version of Cinderella. He may not be royalty, but he’s rich enough to count, and he’s a genuinely nice and charming guy.
- Raven Hair, Ivory Skin: Yuki is the book’s version of Snow White. She has “ivory white skin and dark hair like a raven’s feathers.” She is also considered to be the most beautiful girl in the school.
- Rebellious Princess: Rory is a princess and the only heir to her country. Her status as royalty is hinted at in the first novel and made explicit in the second. Rory hates being a princess, particularly because as her parents' only heir, she is expected to marry a man and continue the family line- despite this being completely incompatible with her personality or sexuality. When her parents try to lock her in the palace to better control her, she repeatedly attempts to break out, rather than falling in line and being the kind of princess her parents want her to be.
- Rewriting Reality: The climax of the second novel ends with Ella writing a happy ending to their stories within the white book, using Yuki's blood as ink. Because of how closely the spell is linked to Yuki's existence, this is enough to rewrite reality so that the protagonists can win.
- Serial Killer: The fake Penelope kills several people over the course of the book. She kills the real Penelope and replaces her before the story even begins. She drowns Ariane when she starts to investigate the book and the curse, setting off the events of the novel. She bashes Micaeli’s head in because she knows too much. It’s unclear how she killed Molly and Ian, but she seems to have either poisoned them or force-fed them chocolate until they died. In fact, the only death in this book that she is not directly responsible for is Annmarie’s, who truly did fall victim to the curse without Penelope to ‘speed up their fate’.
- Snow Means Death: It may or may not be actively snowing, but there is certainly snow on the ground during the climax of the first book. The final fight takes place on top of a frozen lake. Also, Yuki (who represents Snow White and has snow-themed magic) is the darkest of the main characters- killing the fake Penelope with no hesitation or regret, and nearly killing her stepmother in the sequel.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Ella and Freddie break up at the end. There is no big argument or villainous reveal. Throughout the two novels, they seem like a perfect couple with great chemistry, but they just... don't work out, which is very common in real life but tends to be ignored in fiction for the sake of added drama. Not all high school relationships are built to last, and this one wasn't.
