12 Dancing Princesses X 2

Is there something in the air? I have just read not one but two stories based on the same fairy tale, "The Twelve Dancing Princesses".

The first was next years YRCA choice for Grades 7-9, "Princess of the Midnight Ball" by Jessica George where you are introduced to the story of 12 beautiful princesses who are dancing their nights away in an underworld location. It is up to a handsome and kind soldier, Galen, who has been given an invisible cloak as a reward for his thoughtfulness to an old woman and who has fallen in love with the eldest daughter Rose, to save them. Because of his infatuation he is determined to follow and free the princesses from the curse bestowed upon them as result of the wish of their mother to bear her husband a child.

But because the beauty of a fairy tale is that everyone can make it their own, Diane Zahler has also created a story around this same fairy tale called "The Thirteenth Princess".

In this retelling the twelve princesses are also forced to dance their nights away because of magical interference. But in this version they have another 13th sister, Zita, forced to live as a servant as their father believes her to be the cause of his beloved wife's death. But it is Zita who does not fall under the curse and who, with the help of the stable boy, his handsome elder brother and a mysterious old woman living in the woods, is determined to save the sisters she has grown to know and love.

I think the girls will love both.

Incarceron

Simply amazing..... that's my impression of this fantasy novel "Incarceron" by Catherine Fisher. The cover is dark and mysterious and you just know the book is going to be too.

You meet two characters in two different worlds.... Finn is a young man trapped in an underground world, a prison within a prison.... in a hierarchy of degenerates out for themselves, his only friend Keiro, his oathbrother who looks out for him.

Claudia is a young woman, the entitled and privileged daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, the prison, who is slated to marry, against her will, the next king of the kingdom where time has stood still for hundreds of years, where technology has no place unless it is to keep things as they once were.

Does this sound too confusing? As the plot falls into place you see and feel the desperation of those who are trying to escape both prisons and see how they find the key to communicate.

I am off the buy the sequel, Sapphique, tomorrow.

Very True

Have you read "Martha Walks the Dog"by Susan Meddaugh ? The picture book with the talking dog? In it there is a dog who is told by his owner he is a bad dog and because he is called bad he acts very bad... but when he is told he is a good dog, he, well, acts good. Do others opinions of us dictate who we are and how we act?

In "True (...sort of)" by Katherine Hannigan the wonderful main character is Delly. The thing about Delly is that she is always getting into trouble.... not mean trouble but trouble all the same. It all began when she was 6 and went with her family to the County Fair. Delly could not stand to see all those chickens couped up in the coup so she let them all out. She was told it was a Bad BAD thing to do and that she was bad. She believed those words and the trouble went on and on from there...

But Delly has the uncanny understanding of when something good, a surpresent, is going to come to her. ( In Delly language a surpresent is a surprise and a present) And on Saturday Delly just knows a surpresent is coming. She waits all day and finally she feels it coming.... its in a green Impala car that comes bumping and grinding into town. But to her disappointment there is nothing in the car except a pale, skinny boy wearing a too big t shirt. Delly refuses to believe this is her surpresent.

The boy turns out to be a girl, Ferris Boyd, a very special person. Special in that she does not use words or talk ever and cannot be touched. But Delly finds something in her that is fascinating and thus begins a very special friendship.

And then there is Brud, the basketball wanna be, who stumbles over words and friends as well.

I absolutely loved this story.

It demonstrates how very rare good friendship is and once found never let it go, it demonstrates that we can communicate in so many ways if we try very hard.... with a one word note that is tucked into your pocket, with a look that tells everything you are thinking or by just sitting together not doing anything. It demonstrates how Delly and the reader learn so much about life.... that by just asking questions one does not get into trouble.

Special......

The Crime of the ....

A crime has been committed... a very serious crime where $208.00 has been stolen. "The Lemonade War" by Jacqueline Davies was the beginning of the saga when siblings Evan and his younger sister Jessie battled it out to see who could make the most money selling lemonade.

The story continues in "The Lemonade Crime" when Jessie, bright and advanced for her age, particularly in math, is now in Evan's Grade 4 class and overhears Scott tell their classmates that he has just bought a very expensive Xbox 20/20. How interesting when brother Evan has just has the profits of their lemonade war, $208.00, stolen from his shorts as he is swimming in his friend's pool. The plot thickens when it is learned that Scott, also at the same friend's house, had gone to the bedroom alone, quickly changed and and even more quickly headed off.

Jessie puts two and two together and decides to confront Scott with a trial complete with judge, lawyers and jury of classmates, to prove he is, in fact, guilty of theft. Jessie thinks it is a slam dunk but does not account for the fact that members of the class love playing the new Xbox with Scott. Evan is caught up in the middle and things just seem to go from bad to worse.

Read to find out who was right, who was wrong and who did steal the money.