Fairest

 Fairest by Gail Carson Levine, 352 pages.

Aza has an exceptionally fine voice, even by the standards of the nation of Ayortha, who are known for their exceptionally fine voices. Unfortunately it's balanced by the fact that she is also exceptionally ugly, regularly attracting stares from the beauty-obsessed Ayorthans. But it seems her fortunes might just reverse when the innkeeper's daughter is invited to the palace to witness a royal wedding, and even more so when the new queen discovers Aza's unique talent for throwing her singing voice and demands she help her hide her own poor voice. Soon Aza is in over her head, and the world is not at all what she thought it was.

Fairest is a retelling of Snow White in much the same way that Ella Enchanted  (which this is technically a sequel to) is a retelling of Cinderella. Which is to say that it isn't afraid to make changes, and loves to dig into the ramifications of a lot of the baseline assumptions in the original fairy tales. Fairest in particular is concerned mostly the the classical equation of beauty to goodness. I really liked this book as a kid, and I kept thinking about it recently, so I decided to reread it. I think it definitely still holds up! Although it's lack of movie has rendered this book relatively obscure compared to Ella Enchanted I do think that it's just as good, and if you enjoyed that book I would definitely recommend this one.