Rating: Not for me
There are some things I liked & some things I wasn’t super excited about in this fairy-tale spin-off. 

The premise is fun: an average princess who longs to work with animals (and has a special gift of talking with them) is forced to go to The Royal Academy, where (in theory) princesses and princes learn to become good rulers. This begins a tension & theme throughout the series of wanting to follow your dream versus playing your prescribed role.

The main character’s displeasure with attending lends her to question the systems & authority in the school. She is a young woman of substance, and the hero inside her struggles to obey archaic rules that require her to play damsel in distress.  Other students begin to question their roles as well. The disruption of social norms is not welcome.

The themes include: 

  • questioning authority
  • Using gifts vs. Falling into expectations/norms
  • Control, power, & the lust for it
  • Women of substance versus women of superficiality

The biggest thing I didn’t like was how she says silly things like,  “oh my fairies!” or “for the love of Grimm!” or “goblin forbid!”  It’s petty, I admit, but I found it annoying.

At least the violence was mild.

I also want to add that I might recommend this book but I did not like books 2 and 3 in the series: Outlaws and Heroes, respectively. The plot just wasn’t as rich in either, nor was the writing. The subversive themes were trying too hard and it turns out another series by the same author is meant to complement this story, which leaves big gaps that have been sort of hand-waved through. For that reason, I don’t really recommend this one, which would draw readers into the other two.