Saturday, January 17, 2009

Princess Ben by Catherine Gilbert Murdock



Content Rating: 1.1.1
Category: YA, fairy-tale, fantasy
Published: 2008
Audiobook
Review: 3.5/5


Princess Ben is another in a growing list of embellished/expanded/reworked fairytales. I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to those who like Shannon Hale and Gail Carson Levine books. Ben, short for Benevolence, has been raised very differently than a normal princess would be and doesn't understand what is required of her to behave as royalty should. Her aunt tries to teach her how to behave properly but Ben is very stubborn and self-centered. Ben is the narrator so she doesn't say this about herself but you start to realize after a while that although she is funny and likable, she also has some character flaws. That's the thing that sets this book apart from some of the other fairytale books I've read. Ben is not the normal princess that we usually find. I've wavered back and forth between giving this 3.5 and 4 stars. I've finally decided on 3.5 but I'm not exactly sure why. The romance part of it was a little underdeveloped, I think, but it's worth reading if you like this genre.

5 comments:

Chantele Sedgwick said...

I agree about the romance being underdeveloped. They didn't go into it hardly at all! It was a fun clean read though.:)

Suey said...

We got this one for Christmas, so it will surface on the TBR pile sometime this year I hope. But dang! I want romance! :)

max said...

I just had a discussion about the idea of book ratings with a librarian this week. I suggested it was too bad there isn't one like with films, music, and video games.

Author James Patterson has a ten year-old son who doesn’t like to read. So Patterson has established http://www.readkiddoread.com to help other reluctant readers.

I, too, grew up as a reluctant reader. And my father was the author of over 70 books. Now I write action-adventure and mystery books especially for tween boys. My blog, Books for boys, http://booksandboys.blogspot.com is # 4 on Google today.

Max Elliot Anderson

Jeanette said...

I just returned this one to the library, without reading it. Just too many library books checked out right now. I'm hoping to get it again (and actually read it) soon.

Vanessa said...

I've been meaning to read this. Thanks for the review!