The Princess Game (Four Kingdoms, #4)

by Melanie Cellier

[ladygrey]

A mildly entertaining read. The writing is a bit pedestrian but the characters are engaging enough (if a tiny bit lacking in development). She wonderfully knows how to take a wrong turn and have it make the story more interesting. So Cellier should get credit for that if nothing else (that and GORGEOUS covers).

I liked that the story wasn’t predictable at all, even being based on a fairy tale. It moved and changed with a pretty good pace (though with only the barest hint of too much internal monologue—not not enough dialog but the constraints of the story sort of force that—most of the internal monologue was nicely reactionary and relevant rather than brooding).

I liked what there was of the main characters. Except don’t give all the girls such similar sounding names! It’s not even that they all start with C’s but Celeste and Clarisse and Celine and I don’t even know who the others are. Like anyone could keep that straight. Celeste also was a bit too much. Too smart and too beautiful and to good of a fighter and everyone deferred to her as being absolutely right and worthy of devotion. I’d rather see some flaws that had nothing to do with the curse. Or some strengths in her friends and family where they balanced her, like with kindness or compassion or generosity. And Celeste never learned a lesson in humility, just saying. Some sort of balance would have made all the characters more dynamic.

It’s a good fairy tale, though. Sweet and fun enough and plenty of things going on. It reminded me a bit too much of Enchanted (which is a better book) with the godmother and their family gifts and things. But there’s more innocence in this one then there is in the sequels so maybe it evens them out a bit.

Even though this is book 4, I liked that I could start here (because it’s the one library got to me first) without feeling like I’d skipped over anything. The books share characters but stand alone really well. So I’ll have a little bit of fun reading the earlier books when I can.