The Hero's Guide to Saving Your Kingdom by Christopher Healy

436 pages

"Prince Liam. Prince Frederic. Prince Duncan. Prince Gustav. You've never heard of them, have you? These are the princes who saved Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Snow White, and Rapunzel, respectively, and yet, thanks to those lousy bards who wrote the tales, you likely know them only as Prince Charming. But all of this is about to change. Rejected by their princesses and cast out of their castles, Liam, Frederic, Duncan, and Gustav stumble upon an evil plot that could endanger each of their kingdoms. Now it's up to them to triumph over their various shortcomings, take on trolls, bandits, dragons, witches, and other assorted terrors, and become the heroes no one ever thought they could be." -Dust Jacket

My daughters and I loved this book. It is laugh-out-loud funny and has great illustrations for almost every chapter. It's cleverly written and I loved the spin on the classic fairy tales. Frederic has a father who was scarred by chicken pox and doesn't want his son to be physically marred in any way so he requires him to get his beauty sleep and not do anything adventurous. For Ella (Cinderella) that's a problem because he's boring and she loves adventure. Sleeping Beauty is a total brat and Liam refuses to marry her. This damages his reputation as a hero as the people of his kingdom turn on him. Gustav has 16 brothers who get all the fame and glory. Rapunzel, after all, actually saved herself. Duncan and Snow are married, living in the forest, but in a bit of a rut. The princes stumble upon each other at the Stumpy Boarhound, a questionable bar and inn. There they form the League of Princes and set off on an adventure to save the bards from the witch Zaubera and become heroes.

This book took us all summer to read but my girls begged to read every night and could remember details about the story that I couldn't--like the fact that Rapunzel has magical tears which proves vital at one point of the story. Fortunately, there's another book by this author called The Hero's Guide to Storming Your Castle. We can't wait to read it because this one was definitely a favorite.