THE REAL, TRUE DULCIE CAMPBELL

A search for identity and a dose of reality come in a pleasing package. Dulcie lives on a farm in Hollyhock, Iowa, but she knows there’s been a terrible mistake. As she mucks out the chicken coop, she knows her real mother is a queen who would let her eat chocolates all day, and would never wear bunny slippers. Her real dad wouldn’t smell of manure or wake her up early to help with the milking. And surely her real brother wouldn’t steal her underpants and wear them on his head. So she announces she’s Princess Dulcinea and goes off, with her book, to wait for her real, true family to turn up. In the “palace” (read “barn”) she reads about many princesses, and discovers they didn’t always have fun—one even had to kiss a frog. She decides she’s not a princess, vanquishes the ogres in the barn (which she recognizes are as imaginary as her highborn ambitions) and is home in time for dinner. Alley’s (Mrs. Brown on Exhibit, p. 883) illustrations in summer colors do justice to the down-home aspects of the family farm and kitchen as well as Dulcie’s silken-and-gilt royal musings and some pretty neat ogres. (Picture book. 5-8)