THE PRINCESS PROTECTION PROGRAM

Sleeping Beauty wakes up and immediately runs away, then finds herself in a school in the modern day.

Cheeky prose narrates 16-year-old (“but she was also, it dawned on her, one hundred and sixteen!”) Rosamund’s hasty escape from the overeager prince through a nearby bathroom and into an unknown world. Her childhood tutor encouraged her to ask questions, so when she gets to the Orphans’ Home Educational Academy, which cares for fellow princesses (after all, HEA “could stand for Happily Ever After”), that’s the first thing she does. Rosamund’s confusion about cell phones, social media, and jeggings provides light amusement, as do on-the-nose references to Perrault and Calvino that might pass younger readers by. Rosamund soon learns that questions are not welcome, but she can’t silence her curiosity. She sneaks off campus with classmates Rana and Sirena to meet greasy teenage boys and discovers the joys of pizza. When Sirena, aka the Little Mermaid, gets eaten by a monster called an Uponatime, Rosamund realizes she has many more questions, and she must face her fears to figure out her new story. Rosamund’s journey offers some trenchant truisms (“That’s the risk of standing up for yourself…There’s no promise of a happy ending”), and the resolution is appropriately satisfying. While the tone is amusing, the book draws upon the more gruesome traditional versions of the tales. Most characters read white; Rana is olive-skinned.

A lighthearted modern take on the adventures of fairy-tale princesses.