Ivy's Ever After | |||||
Dawn Lairamore | |||||
Holiday House, 320 pages | |||||
A review by John Enzinas
Then she discovers the terrible secret of the kingdom. On her thirteenth birthday, she gets locked up in a tower
with a dragon for a guard until someone comes along and kills the dragon and rescues her (and as part of
the deal marries her and inherits the kingdom). Ivy is, of course, not terribly keen on this idea but
on this one thing her father is adamant. Then comes the first prince. He is a terrible man with terrible
plans for the kingdom which Ivy discovers before she is sent to the tower. She decides to escape and
somehow rescue the kingdom from its terrible fate. In escaping she befriends the dragon sent to guard
her and together they set about to stop the prince, save the kingdom and better the condition of both their peoples.
This is not a complicated story. There are no surprising twists, no astonishing reveals, no subversion of
typical fairy tale tropes (other than the tomboy princess but that's kind of a modern trope). Ivy faces a
series of challenges and overcomes them with the tools she has been given. In the end, the day is saved and
every one lives if not happily, then at least no less happy than they were before the story started (except
for the bad guy).
However, given that the book is aimed at pre-teen girls, I think it nails the level of complexity that it
was going for perfectly. It has good clear messages about self reliance, acceptance of people who are
different and coming to terms with the unreasonable demands of the real world. That last message is,
I think, particularly useful. I'm looking forward to reading this one to my just-turned-seven daughter.
John Enzinas reads frequently and passionately. In his spare time he plays with swords. |
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