The Princess Spy

Hagenheim #5

by Melanie Dickerson

In this historical fairy-tale romance book from bestselling author Melanie Dickerson, based on The Princess and the Frog, Margaretha hopes to find her prince … but when a man claiming to be an English lord arrives at the castle, she finds herself questioning her heart as she uncovers secrets about her current suitor that cast the mysterious lord in a new light.

Margaretha has always been a romantic, and hopes her newest suitor, Lord Claybrook, will be her one true love. But then an injured man is brought to Hagenheim Castle, claiming to be an English lord Claybrook attacked and left for dead. And only Margaretha understands the wild story.

Margaretha convinces herself “Lord Colin” is just addled. Then Colin retrieves an heirloom she lost and asks her to spy on Claybrook as repayment. Margaretha knows she could never be a spy—she unable to keep anything secret—though what she soon discovers changes her romantic notions not about Claybrook but possibly Colin as well. It is up to her to save her father and Hagenheim itself from a wicked plot.

The Princess Spy 

Perfect for teen readers ages 13-18 and adults who enjoy historical romancesA romantic, fast-paced read—sure to entrance fans of fairy tale retellingsA stand-alone story that is also part of the Hagenheim series, featuring the daughter of Rose and Lord HamlinA full-length clean and inspiring love story

Genres: Romance, Historical Fiction, Young Adult, Christian Fiction, Christian, Fantasy, Fairy Tales

300 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 4, 2014

About the author

Melanie Dickerson is the New York Times bestselling author of happily-ever-after romance. She believes in love, laughter, afternoon tea, and the power of story.

With a million books sold and numerous awards, including two Christy Awards, two Golden Quills, a National Readers Choice Award, Christian Retailing’s Best, and Book Buyers’ Best Awards, her books have hit #1 in her category on the New York Times bestseller list.

When she’s not writing, Melanie can be found watching Pride and Prejudice for the hundredth time, cozying up to her handsome hero husband, or shaking her head at her slightly unhinged Jack Russell terrier. She lives in the beautiful foothills of the Appalachians near Huntsville, Alabama.

Reviews

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

The heart of the Holy Roman Empire, 1413

Margaretha is the eldest daughter of Wilhelm and Rose Gerstenberg, Duke and Duchess of Hagenheim. She’s overshadowed by her adventurous older brothers, Valten and Gabe. She enjoys riding horses, she talks way too much, and now she’s entertaining a suitor from across the sea channel, a handsome but stuffy and arrogant Englishman named Lord Claybrook. Margaretha has very little else going on in her life.

Enter Colin, a British youth who wanders into Hagenheim from the forest, feverish and left for dead. The castle healer tends the lad, and Margaretha becomes fascinated by him. When his fever breaks, he realizes that only Margaretha can speak his language—this is a MAJOR historical inaccuracy which I will be tearing my hair out about shortly.

Colin reveals to his sole interlocutor that he’s on Claybrook’s trail. The man murdered a woman back in England and is now responsible for at least one death on German soil. Understandably, Colin fears that Claybrook has nefarious intentions regarding Margaretha and her people. He asks her to spy on His Lordship. Everyone thinks Margaretha is a bit of a ditz, so no one will ever suspect her.

Margaretha doesn’t trust herself to do this job. She can neither stop talking for five minutes straight nor keep a secret. But she’s the only person present who can speak both English and German (argh, I’m getting to that) and is also willing to help. (There’s also a priest who can speak a variety of languages, but like most Dickerson priests, he’s a sniveling coward. Another rant for later).

No sooner has she agreed to the plan that she overhears Claybrook in private audience with the dozen goons retinue he brought from England, conveniently reviewing his entire plan to take over Hagenheim, kill the Duke and his heir Valten, and marry Margaretha (by force if necessary) to put a flimsy veil of legitimacy on the proceedings. Claybrook expects his German uncle, a neighboring duke, to assist him. He thinks he killed Colin on the road...

Before Margaretha can tell her family what’s she’s stumbled into, her dad and Valten leave Hagenheim to consult with her mom’s family in nearby Marienburg, and Claybrook begins to work his nefarious scheme…

Content Advisory
Violence: More carnage than previous installments in this series—not super gory, but still a bit jarring in a cutesy period piece like this. The book opens with Colin trying to revive his friend John, who was brutalized by Claybrook and company. We also get descriptions of Claybrook throwing a pregnant girl into the river to hide his having fathered her child.

Margaretha clobbers assorted lowlifes with whatever heavy object she can find, often leaving impressive injuries. The Captain of the Guard cuts a few bad-guy throats. Various hoodlums and highwaymen threaten our heroine with theft and (implied) rape. They get away with the former but not the latter. There’s a battle at the end with no significant deaths.

Sex: Colin and Margaretha like each other right away but spend most of the book angsting over it and not communicating with each other because propriety, which was very low on the average medieval person’s list of priorities in real life but never mind. They kiss a few times toward the end. Some brigands leer at Margaretha and threaten to strip her to her undergarments and sell her gown. This does not happen.

Language: Nothing.

Substance Abuse: Lord Claybrook is a drunkard, because we won’t believe he’s evil unless he suffers from every single vice known to humanity. He gets impressively sloshed the night before the battle and can’t accomplish the worst of his evil plans.

Nightmare Fuel: Colin has a brief flashback of when Philippa was retrieved from the river, her corpse pallid and bloated.

The Catholic Elephant in the Room
Melanie Dickerson’s Hagenheim books remind me a great deal of Mary Hoffman’s Stravaganza series. Both are full of exciting adventures, cute pairings, fun set pieces, a wonderfully atmospheric world, and fairytale influences.

Unfortunately, both are also hamstrung by clunky narration, info-dump dialogue with few if any distinct character voices, sloppy editing, and a very casual relationship with the historical record. That last one is kind of a problem when you’re writing historical fantasy, to say nothing of historical fiction.



With Hoffman, we get stupid stuff in the Talia-verse like silver and gold having reversed chemical properties or Mary I, Elizabeth I, and Edward VI all being the offspring of Catherine of Aragon, eliminating (according to Hoffman in her author’s note for City of Masks) any need for a Protestant Reformation. Because we all know how much Martin Luther cared about Henry VIII’s succession anxiety. Not to mention that the people of Talia are more or less openly worshipping the old gods when only the wonkiest Renaissance eccentrics did that in our world.

Hoffman’s breaks with reality seem benignly motivated, though—I don’t think she put much thought into it beyond “This would look cool.”

With Dickerson, though, there is definitely a pattern to the discrepancies between her image of medieval Germany and the real thing.

1. Dickerson’s characters pray in the stream-of-consciousness style favored by modern Evangelicals and Charismatic Catholic youth groups. Like so: Father God, You are mighty to save—help me to [insert scary thing I don't wanna do here].

This is not how they prayed in the Middle Ages. The Hagenheim universe is completely bereft of litanies, rosaries, or any pre-written prayer. The characters also never pray for the intercession of the Virgin Mary or any saints. These things were all a huge part of medieval culture. Ignoring them is like writing a book about an Amish community that has electricity.

2. Many of Dickerson’s characters carry partial or complete Bibles in their native languages. The first German Bible didn’t appear until 1522, and the first English one not until 1526.

3. Priests, nuns and friars made up a sizeable chunk of the European population during the medieval period. Yet in the Dickerson-verse, we have only a handful of priests. The live ones are all cowards and mercenaries; the good ones are dead before the story begins. So far we’ve seen only one monk—a friar of unspecified order who behaves more like a nineteenth-century American itinerant preacher, and sounds more like a modern evangelical minister, than he resembles anything from fifteenth-century Germany. Nuns don’t appear to exist in this world at all.

4. All of these characters have crosses, worn upon their persons or hanging on their walls. These are plain crosses, with no corpus carved or even painted on. The plain cross was not used in this manner until John Calvin, over a hundred years after these stories take place. As a Quora user rather insightfully phrased it, “The difference between the cross and the crucifix is that we remember Christ crucified when we look upon the crucifix, and Christ risen when we look upon a plain cross.” (Links at the bottom of the review).

Medieval and Renaissance Christianity focused on the Passion of Jesus, sometimes at the expense of the Resurrection. The contemporary Protestant focus on the Resurrection, sometimes at the expense of the Passion, is a very recent historical shift, beginning in the United States in the nineteenth century. The medieval worldview was very influenced by St. Augustine of Hippo, preoccupied with sin and atonement. The modern Christian worldview prefers to focus on hope and redemption.

I’m Roman Catholic and I can see that the medieval Catholic view was depressing and a bit morbid; I’m not arguing that that’s the only or even right way to worship. But that was where they were in those days. Authors should represent that faithfully.

If Dickerson so dislikes Catholic culture that she’ll go this far out of her way to avoid writing about it, she should have kept the German setting but moved the stories forward a hundred years, allowing for Protestant characters. Either that or set them in an imaginary land very like medieval Germany, but not quite the real thing, where she could shape the religious practices of the inhabitants to her taste.

Lingua Franca
I posted a nitpick of a status update while reading this, complaining that any German speaking English at this time was a huge stretch. My brilliant friend Tiffany pointed out that the language of diplomacy, and the British aristocracy, during the era of this book, was not English anyway, but French.

When William the Conqueror sailed from Normandy and subjugated England in 1066, he set up his followers as feudal lords over the Saxons who already lived there. The Normans spoke various northern and western dialects of French. Isolated from France for generations, the new gentry’s multiple tongues eventually gelled into a single dialect, now called Anglo-Norman French.

Meanwhile the English language continued to develop, but was spoken almost exclusively by the serf class. Since the lords and ladies didn’t interact much with the peasants who farmed their land, it’s unlikely that a lad with Colin’s social standing would have learned the language of said peasants. He certainly would not have considered that his mother tongue.

As a noblewoman, Margaretha might indeed have gotten a bit of education in foreign languages, but it’s highly unlikely that the language of the English underclass would have been among them. Continental Europe did not really take England seriously as a world power until the Tudor Dynasty, which would not rise until 1485, seventy-two years after this story takes place. But if Marge were among the learned noblewomen of her time, she would have certainly learned French. France was a formidable country then, and its language was (and still is) associated with high status and sophistication.

So in a more realistic version of this story, the whole Hagenheim family would likely be able to communicate with Colin, given that they and he would be speaking slightly different French dialects.

This information is not hard to find, so why would Dickerson ignore it? Did the publishers think that the YA audience wouldn’t be able to comprehend that the wealthy Brits spoke French once upon a time? Or was pre-Revolutionary France just too Catholic to talk about?

The Boy in the Ugly Green Clothes
Dickerson’s retellings of “Snow White & the Seven Dwarves” and “Cinderella”—The Fairest Beauty and The Captive Maiden, respectively—stuck reasonably close to the source material and were much better for it. (I didn’t like the second half of Maiden much, mostly because it diverges from the original tale to the point where one can no longer tell what story it’s supposed to be). Unfortunately, The Princess Spy is closer to book one in the series, The Healer’s Apprentice. Apprentice is a “Sleeping Beauty” retelling, and Spy is based on “The Frog Prince” but it would be hard to connect either novel to the tales that inspired them without help.

The defining feature of “The Frog Prince”, for me at least, is that at first the princess wants absolutely nothing to do with that frog. And one really can’t blame her, because he is extremely annoying. He hops after her wherever she goes, insisting on sharing her food and sleeping on her pillow, threatening to tattle on her when she resists. Dude comes on way too strong, has no concept of personal space, and can’t tell when he’s not wanted. Compared to Beauty’s Beast, the Frog Prince is a hard character to like; the former enchanted prince accepts his lady’s judgment on him, the latter manipulates fate as hard as he can.

So while the princess is certainly spoiled and should have known better than to bargain with a clearly enchanted talking animal in a deserted place, I still empathize with her when she finally snaps:

…she became bitterly angry and threw him against the wall with all her might. "Now you will have your peace, you disgusting frog!"

But when he fell down, he was not a frog, but a prince with beautiful friendly eyes…

Yeah, she didn’t save him with a kiss in the original. Tough love.

Obviously the dynamic between these two characters would have to be changed a little in a full-length novel like this, and the prince would need some tweaking in order to not come across like a major creep. But in a retelling, one should still be able to see a trace or two of the original story in there somewhere.

Unfortunately, we only have two references to the original tale in this novel: the garish green hand-me-down clothes that Colin spends the first half of the book wearing, and him salvaging a trinket of Margaretha’s that fell down a well in exchange for her helping him.

The most glaring discrepancy is that Margaretha is never, at any point, repulsed by Colin.

The “disgusting frog” angle is gone. He’s flawlessly handsome from the start. People call him “Frog-Boy” even though the only remotely froglike aspect of his appearance is that temporary green ensemble. Couldn’t he at least have long, skinny limbs and giant feet? An unusually deep voice? I was listening to a Fun song on YouTube once and there were a bunch of girls in the comment section squealing over Nate Ruess’ “froggy lips.” I could easily picture Ruess as a fairytale prince, specifically this fairytale prince, for that very reason.



So let’s say that he’s not ugly on the outside. But shouldn’t he still be obnoxious, since that’s the main character trait of the prince in the story? Shouldn’t he still be pushy and arrogant, and have to learn that boorish behavior will only get him thrown against the wall?

And shouldn’t Margaretha also be just a tiny bit careless and bratty, to line up with her inspiration? You know, so these characters can learn stuff and grow and change as the story progresses?

Of course not. The characters in these books are only allowed to have the smallest of flaws.

The adventure part of the book was still lots of fun, but would have been so much more enjoyable if Colin and Margaretha were getting on each other’s nerves the whole time, a la Benedick and Beatrice or Han Solo and Princess Leia. Instead, we got a lot of them moping that they could never be together for stupid reasons that could have been cleared up in two minutes.

Dickerson missed an opportunity with John, Colin’s loyal manservant, who could have been brought back in the end as a nod to the original prince’s coachman, Iron Henry, the only character in the story to whom the Grimms gave a proper name. Unfortunately, this character is never brought up again in the novel.

Claybrook is too over-the-top evil for no reason to take seriously as a villain. He has all these terrible plans but lacks the intelligence to carry them out. Philippa’s fate was darker than I expected from this series, but that is not a bad thing.

Conclusions
I liked The Fairest Beauty and thought The Captive Maiden was fun overall. The Princess Spy was fine as an escapist adventure/romance, but the glaring historical inaccuracies were harder to ignore this time around. I find the Gerstenberg family rather charming and will continue to read their adventures, but this was not one of their stronger stories. It’s a largely harmless, squeaky clean teen read—just beware of the Catholic erasure.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cross vs. Crucifix meaning
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-Catholic...

Medieval Languages
http://homes.chass.utoronto.ca/~cperc...

https://www.legallanguage.com/legal-a...

The original Frog Prince
https://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm001.html

[Natalie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wow. This was....kind of a horrible book. To be fair, let me try to think of something I liked.
Hmmm.
1) Well, it's a retelling of "The Frog Prince" which I thought was interesting, especially since the retelling is accomplished without magic or there ACTUALLY being a frog.

That's about it. :P

What I didn't like:
1) The characters. They're always the same. Beautiful girl. Extremely handsome guy. They become physically attracted to each other and spend the rest of the novel trying not to be. Blahhh.
2) The heroine, Margaretha, kept claiming her worst fault was that she talked too much. ??? Talking too much is honestly your worst fault? Why couldn't the author give her characters "real" flaws? How about pride? Envy? Selfishness? Her characters are always so kind and perfect and wonderful that they have to claim "talking too much is my worst fault". :P
3) Too. Much. Kissing. Behold:
"'You are indeed a woman of great worth, and I do not think you talk too much.' He took her face in his hands and kissed her briefly on the lips. 'I am happiest when I can hear your voice.' He kissed her again. 'And I thank God that you love me.' He kissed her for a long time."
UGHHH.
4)I can't stand it when the entire "romance" consists of the hero and heroine simply battling their longing to kiss one another or hug. This happens constantly throughout the book. And they just won't stick to their resolutions. In one scene, Colin, comforts Margaretha by holding her close but then realizes "he must never hold her like this again." Guess what happens a mere 17 pages later?
'He sat close beside her, pulling the horse blanket around Margaretha and the child. He also wrapped his arms round them....'
STAHHPP.
5) The evil villain laugh. Just stop. What are you doing.
"He walked away, and his laugh floated down the corridor after he was gone."
"He chortled drunkenly."
"'Even the king with sanction our marriage.' Lord Claybrook laughed."

6) The obviously Ever After inspired scene with the bandits and her dress. It was so boring.
7) Pretty much every scene where something went "wrong" on their journey was boring. Because everything went "right" again in no time at all.
8) The entire trip from Hangenheim castle to Anne's father's house consisted of Colin and Magaretha arguing about whether she was going with him to get help.
9)The little boy they found, Toby, acted like he was two not five. He squeals and wants to pick wildflowers and continually asks Margaretha if she and Colin are in love and why they don't kiss. Like a five year old boy would care??!
10) The characters continually ask forgiveness for lying to their enemies or stealing some supplies they intend to return. Colin even asks her to forgive him because he called her a "flibbertigibbet" when they first met. But, throughout the entire story, they never once think they should ask forgiveness for the way they've been hugging or desiring each other so much or for that time Colin caresses her cheek for no reason at all.
I GET IT, OKAY ? THEY'RE IN "LOVE". I'm not saying stealing is right or that physical touch is wrong, but still. I feel like Melanie Dickerson is giving young Christian girls a very skewed view of love by having her characters always kissing and hugging and holding hands—and wanting to do so when they're not.
Time and again I find myself trying a Melanie Dickerson book because of my love for medieval fairytale retellings. But after this one, I'm not so sure I'll be brave enough to try another....I'd like to keep my sanity, thank you. -_-

[Lindsey (Books for Christian Girls) · Rating 4 out of 5]

WARNING! This whole review I'll be:



About this book:

“Margaretha has always been a romantic, and hopes her newest suitor, Lord Claybrook, is destined to be her one true love. But then an injured man is brought to Hagenheim Castle, claiming to be an English lord who was attacked by Claybrook and left for dead. And only Margaretha---one of the few who speaks his language---understands the wild story. Margaretha finds herself unable to pass Colin's message along to her father, the duke, and convinces herself 'Lord Colin' is just an addled stranger. Then Colin retrieves an heirloom she lost in a well, and asks her to spy on Claybrook as repayment. Margaretha knows she could never be a spy---not only is she unable to keep anything secret, she's sure Colin is completely wrong about her potential betrothed. Though when Margaretha overhears Claybrook one day, she discovers her romantic notions may have been clouding her judgment about not only Colin but Claybrook as well. It is up to her to save her father and Hagenheim itself from Claybrook's wicked plot.”


Series: All of Melanie Dickerson’s books are connected: “The Princess Spy” is considered #5 in this series. “The Healer’s Apprentice”(#1, review Here!), “The Merchant’s Daughter” (#2, review Here!), “The Fairest Beauty”(#3, review Here!), “The Captive Maiden”(#4, review Here!) and coming in out tomorrow {11/4/2014!}, “The Princess Spy”; should be read in this order for the least amount of spoilers.


Spiritual Content- Many, many, many Prayers; Lots of Thanking God; Psalm 1 is quoted; Talks about God using the weak; Many talks about & of God; Strong Faiths.


Negative Content- Minor cussing including: two ‘stupid’s, a man is called the ‘devil’ and “this spawn of the devil”, a horse is called a “devil of a horse”; a fight & a man dies (barely-above-not-detailed); two men get killed (border line barely-above-not-detailed // semi-detailed); Blood (highest being semi-detailed); Hares get skinned & eaten (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of drinking.


Sexual Content- a handful of not-detailed kisses, a semi-detailed kiss & a detailed kiss; Wanting to kiss; Hand kisses; A dream about kissing someone (semi-detailed); an embrace (border line barely-above-not-detailed // semi-detailed); two mentions of a bedchamber; a baby was conceived out of wedlock; a ‘wench’; Love, falling in love, & the emotions.

-Margaretha, age 18
-Colin, age 20
P.O.V. switches between them
Set in 1413 {Medieval}
292 pages

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Pre Teens- One Star
New Teens- Two Stars
Early High School Teens- Three Stars
Older High School Teens- Four Stars
My personal Rating- Four Stars

{ These ratings are for girls who have read the previous books in this series & would enjoyed all the tie-ins. Should be read in order! }

Every. Body. Fan. Girl. Go!
/// I fangirled so stinkin’ hard throughout this book! (It connects #2 (My favorite!) to #1 and #3 and #4!! AHHHH!!!) I also really loved the Strong Faiths! (Some great prayers in this novel!)
I’d also like to said that I loved Margaretha! We’re so much alike! She was so much fun!
“The Princess Spy” really gave my favorite Melanie Dickerson book “The Merchant’s Daughter” a run for it’s money!
I really didn’t know much about the whole Princess & the Frog storyline, so before I read this book I watched the Disney movie of that title. Interesting movie, to say the least! ;)

And when I found out who Colin was…well…




Link to review:
http://booksforchristiangirls.blogspo...



*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
*I received this book for free from the Publisher (Zondervan) for this review.

[Jesseca Wheaton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was at the library the other day and saw this book along with 2 others by Melenie Dickerson. I had no idea they were in a series, so I checked them out and started reading the one that looked the most interesting. Once I finished I looked up the author. . .and realized this is the 5th book in the series. :P Oh well, now I'm going back and reading the beginning ones. :)

I absolutely LOVED the book! I have never been a huge fan of fairy-tails, but I am loving all the retellings I've been finding! I also love the historical setting this book was written in and it made it all the more interesting. It's a book I will probably re-read (at least parts of it) And I'm looking forward to reading all the others in the series! :)

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sweet fairy tale with adventure, romance, humor and wonderful christian values all tied up in a wonderful story. I look forward to my daughters reading this series when they are older.

[Mary-Faith · Rating 2 out of 5]

I feel really bad about this. I love Melanie Dickerson, and I love the Hagenheim books, but this one just didn’t work for me. I couldn’t get into the story at all. It just felt kind of meh to me.

I was so excited to read a book with Margaretha as the MC because I’ve loved her when she’s shown up in her brothers’ stories, and she was definitely my favorite part. She was such a kind, strong character. Colin, on the other hand...ehh, I didn’t really like him. So I felt kind of indifferent towards his relationship with Margaretha, which was a bit of a problem since that was the main point of the book.

Also, I had a problem with the attitude toward women in this book. I know this is set several centuries ago, but I feel like the disrespect for women was much more evident in this book than it has been in any other book in the series. It just bothered me.

Overall, this just didn’t work for me. And I’m really sad about it!

[Sarah Ryder · Rating 4 out of 5]

This has been one of my favorite Melanie Dickerson books for a long time and I’m so glad it remained so upon this reread!

Margaretha and Colin are wonderful, compelling characters who go through a lot on this wild adventure and the Frog Prince hints/elements are the lightest out of all her books I’ve read but still work and are evident in their limited context.

One thing I don’t like about her books though and that REALLY stood out upon reread is how she repeats nearly EVERYTHING to the point of distraction and, worse, irritation, though this book’s constant reputation isn’t as bad or annoying as some of her others. It’s just annoying because I don’t need to be reminded of who someone’s best friend is or what the main character’s flaws are, etc. every other page—I get it, please move on! That’s why even though I still like the book I had to dock a star from its previous five star glory.

A fun, fast paced story with good characters and a fun adventure I enjoyed revisiting. Will be keeping this book on my shelves!


‼️Content‼️

Language: son of hell; wench

Violence: fighting with weapons and hand to hand (not detailed); injuries and blood (not detailed); a man is murdered (action not shown, just his body; not detailed); a character is beaten and left for dead (not detailed); a man strangled a woman to death (not shown); a character is beaten (not detailed)

Sexual: in the past a man impregnated a woman; very mild suggestive hints; kissing (not detailed)

Drugs/Alcohol: characters drink wine at meals; a man is poisoned

Other: death and grief; a kingdom takeover and plot to murder the duke and his heir; a character is chained up in a dungeon; a character is tied up and kidnapped; a forced marriage; dead bodies

[Jasmine (Jazzie) [Jesus Loves You!!] · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rtc!

[Abigail · Rating 5 out of 5]

*sigh* How is Melanie Dickerson such a great author that she can write so many great books?!? I love all of her books. But this one holds all special part in my heart only because I am so much like Margaretha that it's slightly scary....xD

And Colin. Like come on how could you NOT lovr Colin?? He's such a sweatheart!!

Go read this book, if you haven't please!! But make sure that you read the others in the series first because everything would make more sense if you did!!!

[E.F. Buckles · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has such mixed reviews from my friends I was a little afraid what I might think of it. My overall conclusion is that I liked it well enough. It's no where near my favorite of this series, but it was fine and I was in the mood for something light and fluffy, so it struck the right cord for me at this time.

To get a little more specific, this is probably one of the looser retellings Melanie Dickerson has done, at least that I've read so far. It has to be hard to write a no-magic retelling of a fairytale that was pretty much dependent on magic in the original. (There's not really a way to have someone turn from a literal frog back to a person in real life.) I had to look pretty hard to see the references to the original fairytale and sometime nearly forgot that this was even a retelling. This didn't necessarily take away from my enjoyment of the book, but from the standpoint of having wanted to read a retelling, it didn't quite live up to what I like in that regard.

The story itself apart from the retelling was good enough, though I was hoping for a little more spying from our princess in order to justify the book's title. She actually only spied a couple times and then other things started happening. I felt like the book got a little bit of a slow start and I actually was struggling to get invested initially, but it did pick up before the halfway point, at which point I started getting a more into it. Parts of it were even exciting and had me reading a little faster.

Margaretha was a little harder for me to connect with than some other main characters in this series. I guess it was because our personalities are so different. She chatters on to people whereas (in real life, at least) I tend to be the quietest person in the room unless I'm with people I know, love, and am comfortable with. Even then, I'm not always as forthcoming with words as other people. Margaretha worries that her babbling annoys people, while I worry more that people think that because I'm not saying anything that I am therefore not thinking anything either when I very much am and they'd probably be overwhelmed by everything that goes through my brain. Heck, sometimes *I'm* overwhelmed by it. Anyway... I did warm up to Margaretha as the story went on, but still never *really* connected with her or liked her as much as some other Dickerson heroines. (I also thought she felt younger than 18 for reasons I can't quite put my finger on.) Sorry, Margaretha.

I had trouble connecting with Colin at first, too. Once again, he was okay and I warmed up to him more as the story went on, but in the beginning I was really wondering if he was even a nice guy and how he and Margaretha would end up together when it didn't seem that he liked her that much to start with. It turned out that he was a pretty nice guy. He was just focused more on his mission at the beginning than anything else and also struggling with anger at some huge injustices (can't blame him for that) that he needed to learn to let go so that he could focus on actual justice instead of revenge. So, in the end, I did kind of like him, but didn't necessarily fall in love with him immediately like with some other Dickerson heroes. Sorry, Colin.

The romance between them was okay, but again, not a favorite. I was happy enough that things worked out for them in the end, but also wasn't necessarily really rooting for or against them during the story, and while the wedding at the end was a satisfying conclusion, I wasn't so happy about it I was hugging the book or anything. *shrug*

For something I did really like, I loved that Rose got a slightly more active role in this one. The Healer's Apprentice remains one of my favorites from this series and while it's nice to see Rose and Wilhelm's family grow and watch their children's stories unfold, sometimes I want just a little more than a cameo from the parents and I got a little bit of that in this book. Like Rose herself said, she wasn't always a sheltered Duke's wife and it was nice to see a little glimpse of her old personality here while also seeing her trying to actively protect one of her children by coming up with a sneaky plan to trick the bad guy. (I still wish she would have gotten to knock him over the head, though. Dude was jerk of the highest degree. *cackles quietly about the whole wine situation because he totally deserved that*)

Overall conclusion: This was a fluffy, sweet read that was okay, but nowhere near a new favorite in the Hagenheim series for me personally. It entertained me well enough, I just didn't fall in love with it. Having skimmed the positive, negative, and in between reviews of my friends a while back I was kind of expecting this to be the case, so not necessarily a disappointment. Therefore, I am giving this my didn't-love-it-didn't-hate-it rating of 3 stars.

Content Advisory:
Books for Christian Girls has read all of Melanie Dickerson's books always does an excellent job thoroughly reviewing them for content, so I shall save myself some time and link to her content advisory. 😉 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Ashley Stangl · Rating 1 out of 5]

"The Princess Spy" sounded promising. "The Frog Prince" with spies! I was interested to see how Melanie Dickerson adapted a fairy tale that hadn't been done by Disney, especially since the last two books in the series had contained much more action and much less preaching than the first two books.

It started out interesting, as Margaretha meets Colin, an injured English stranger ranting about murderers. But as soon as he recovers and Margaretha starts her spying, things go downhill fast. The villain's plot is ludicrous, and the way Margaretha discovers it is unbelievably convenient. But hey, a villain wants to take over the town and kill her family--it should be good for some action and intrigue, right?

Wrong. Colin and Margaretha go on the run, and 75% of the prose follows this pattern: "Oh my, he/she is wonderful. I'm falling in love. Oh, no, I mustn't fall in love, because it will never work out. But he/she is so beautiful. I want to kiss him/her. No, I mustn't." I kept hoping that things would get better, because even if these books aren't great literature, they're generally fairly enjoyable stories, but each chapter just continued the downward spiral of romantic angst. Even in the MIDDLE OF THE FINAL BATTLE, they're stopping to kiss and flirt with each other and discuss their future and most of the actual fighting happens off-screen.

I think this is the first Goodreads book I've actually finished and still rated one star. I feel bad for the review, because these books are so gentle and harmless, but I can't get over my disappointment of having a great action premise squashed under repetitive romantic angst.

[Katie Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Margaretha's story is riveting! Melanie does a fantastic job of weaving romance throughout, and there wasn't anything NOT to love. I definitely recommend it to anyone who is a fan of fairytale retellings, action-packed adventures, and great romances.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

2018 Review
Best Part of this book: The Dads walking in on the couple kissing and the one Dad being like 'Saw this coming' and the other one being like...????



Wort Part: EveryscenewithMargarethaandColin
I mean....whhaaaaatttt.....

If you want the happy, perky version of this review, see my 2015 review. If you want my I-haven't-had-enough-coffee-yet review, keep reading.
Here is the deal. I don't know how bad the books were I was reading in 2015, but my praise seems a little much even to me.

I re-read this book because I remember it being my favorite of the Hagenheim series. And I guess compared to the first one it holds the story together better? From a writing standpoint it is better. And it misquotes Scripture less.

But Colin and Margaretha are actually...really annoying. They're going into battle where people will DIE and they just keep making lovey dovey eyes at one another. Her family could be brutally murdered at any second and she's like "Dang...Colin sure has broad shoulders. And such piercing blue eyes!"
And Colin is like "Vengeance for girl I used to crush on! Until new crush. Now no vengeance." (I know that isn't how it went down, but think about it.)
There are just so many hormones flying around in this book!
I get it is the genre. I get this is better than most. I think my frustration comes from the fact that there is a really interesting story going on but the two perfect main characters with their perfect personalities and perfect, chaste love keep getting in the way of it.

2015 Review
Margaretha!!!!

~~~~~
You can let go of that breath you're holding, I liked it. I really and truly did. I really enjoy seeing how Melanie Dickerson's writing has improved over time. It caught me up right away and kept me hooked till the end. This book reminded me of my initial affection for The Healer's Apprentice without my subsequent hesitation.
There was a specific bad guy who was evil, no ambiguity! No long passages thanking God for someone else's physical attractiveness (some admiration does help and Colin sure does love calling Margaretha beautiful, but the book doesn't have those prayer-praise pages that previously drove me crazy) I wasn't overwhelmed by Christianese that felt forced. In fact, I enjoyed reading the prayers and added Scripture. It flowed with the story and characters. I liked the characters, a great deal. Their motivation didn't leave me screaming.
Margaretha is a flawed and fun character. She's totally kick-butt. But not in the overwhelmingly perfect way. Such a plus.
I liked Colin! Yes, a Dickerson hero who didn't drive me nuts! I like that he got over his issues so fast, but believably. I like that he is "impulsive" yet sweet. I like that he protects her emotions. And by that I mean I like he is not Gabe. He is better than Valten (who, BTW, I even loved this book.)
The romance...was handled better than usual. I mentally brace myself before I begin because I don't normally read Christian romance anything. Melanie Dickerson tends to be a rare exception. In this case, I didn't really need to brace myself too much. I mean, they do go on and on about the other person but their thoughts aren't entirely consumed with the other person's physical appearance (total plus). They also show more friendship before they get romantic. I like that it isn't love at first sight. I liked the ending too. It felt believable and romantic. The thought of poor Colin's Dad walking in on those two kissing when he had no clue what was going on did make me laugh. Hard. I got some weird looks. But can you just imagine for that poor man...?
Of course the book isn't perfect. There remains a great of deal of telling, re-telling, and re-hashing of that telling. 'She won't want to come to England.' 'I talk too much'. 'You're so beautiful.' It gets a tad irritating.
Also, passages like: "Her brown eyes sparkled with intelligence..." How DO eyes sparkle with intelligence? I've always wondered. At any rate it wasn't too distracting, just occasional bursts of extreme enthusiasm that felt jarring.
My favorite so far! I look forward to upcoming books

[Kristen Kooistra · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Princess Spy's title is a bit deceiving. In truth, Margaretha only accomplishes one spy mission and it's rather dull in the fact she just hides up a tree for a bit and then passes the information along. Most of the book is not about her spying, though it is a bit of a running joke.

Things I liked about the book:

Margaretha is not your typical princess. She's curious, talkative to the point of being a chatterbox, and not afraid to help someone who seems crazy. Margaretha struggles throughout the book with knowing that she rambles. It was very refreshing because I know people who say they struggle with how to be a good conversationalist. How not to bulldoze the person they talk to, how not to interrupt, how to not go overboard so that people zone out or avoid talking to you. All things that real people struggle with and some of them know it, and want to improve. I liked that Maragretha represented those people.

I enjoyed the communication barrier between the two main characters. We're able to understand the conversation between the two, not have it awkward in anyway, but also seeing the points where either the MMC is lost because he can't understand, or the FMC is trying to find the english equivalent of what she wants to say.

The plot was interesting to a degree. It was fun to follow Margaretha's haphazard dash from here to there and the book covers a lot of ground.

This was a fun, clean book and I'm glad to have read it.

I found that the pace dragged a few times and I'd skip a few paragraphs to hurry up and get to the next part as it'd ruin the tension a bit when things suddenly slowed down. There was no real plot twists or unseen elements to the novel. It was very predictable. I can understand guessing how it'll all end(well for the MC's tends to be the rule of thumb), but I like to be surprised along the journey to get there and that didn't happen.

All in all, it was a good book, but I won't read it again.

[Raechel Lenore · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yep, just read this one for the third time, this time around was with my sister. I enjoyed it very much and it was even more fun reading it with her.

--------
Just finished this for the 2nd time. :)

Review from the first read through (November 12 2014):
I haven’t read any of Miss Dickerson’s books previously, though I wanted to, and so when I saw this book available to be reviewed, I jumped at the possibility. It was very good, and I will most definitely continue to read books by this author.
“The Princess Spy” has a light, fairy-tale feel to it, without the magic, and most importantly, with faith as a big aspect, which I really liked. This is a book I would allow my younger sister (and future children of my own one day) to read at the right age.
From what I gathered, this book was a sort of retelling of The Frog Prince. There wasn’t a whole lot that gave clues to that, but I also am not overly familiar with that fairy tale to begin with.
The characters were fun, and likeable (except for the unlikeable ones – the bad ones!), and reading about Margaretha and Colin’s journey was enjoyable. I liked the little boy they found later on, too – he added goodness to the tale as well.
The only thing I would have liked is just a little more God-oriented moments. But really, for the most part, that was handled well.
I would recommend this to anyone that enjoys a good fairy-tale retelling/feel, and enjoys a fun read!

Thank you to the publishers for sending me a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for my honest review, which I have given.

[Laura A. Grace · Rating 4 out of 5]

What another delightful fairytale retelling by Melanie! I think this one is probably my favorite out of all the Hagenheim residents’ stories!

I really liked Margaretha and am glad her story was told because there is so much more to her then the sibling who can’t keep a secret. She’s brave, loyal, and just plain awesome in so many ways. I also liked Colin and thought he was a great hero (not to mention attractive).

“The Princess Spy” was fairly slow paced, but I wouldn’t say it was a bad thing. I greatly appreciated how the romance bloomed slowly and thought it was very refreshing. It was extremely respectful and set a great example for teenage girls.

The message of the novel was by far very inspiring! To simply trust God at all times is something I struggle with and am grateful that Melanie gives readers characters who learn that truth as well as live it out. I deemed the book’s mantra Margaretha’s words “Nothing is too hard for God” and plan to adopt them as my own.

This is a great YA novel that I would recommend! It will definitely not only entertain with the action, possibly swoon with romance, but also challenge to seek as well as trust God in every situation despite all odds.

*(I received an ARC of this novel from the author. All thoughts expressed are my own and I was not required to write a positive review.)*

[H.S.J. Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

I decided to give this author another try, and I will say I enjoyed this one much better than her first. It's a nicely paced princess story with sweet, if slightly stereotypical characters. I do wish that it'd had a better climax. In fact, there almost was no climax. With such an exciting beginning and plot, I rather expected more. It's more fluffy than most books I read, despite the dangerous villain, but I enjoyed it.

[Carrie Schmidt · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

Loved this retelling of The Frog Prince! Melanie Dickerson, as always, hits it out of the fairy-tale retelling park :) Particularly enjoyed the chance to revisit the world of my still-favorite-of-hers The Merchant's Daughter (may or may not have grinned like a besotted fool when I realized who we were talking to). See more here: https://readingismysuperpower.wordpre...

[Brittany · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 ✨

Sweet and Clean YA romance.

This was my least favorite of the series so far but was still a good read. I think the main character got on my nerves a little bit because she’s known for being a chatterbox and she tells everyone she talks a lot . Once was enough, but she says it repeatedly and shocker - she does talk a lot 😅.

[Rissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Semi, sort of twist on Merlin and King Arthur times and I really enjoyed it. Anything having anything to do with that era and King Arthur themed characters gets me hooked right away.

[J.C. Morrows · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVE having author friends!!!

Melanie has informed me that this is NOT the last book of the series! Anyone else doing the happy dance right now? WOW! WOW! WOW!

I know I’m excited!


OK…this review, the review on Amazon and the review on my blog have been edited to reflect that but there’s nothing I can do about ChristianBook.com so… *shrugs*



Melanie Dickerson is a genius!

I picked this book up earlier to pass the time while my kiddos were playing outside and I just couldn’t put it down.

I do believe I may have a new favorite!

The Princess Spy is a fantastic story and I’m so thrilled that Melanie has at least two more books that will follow these beloved characters and are coming to us soon!


I feel so blessed to have received an advance look at The Princess Spy (especially since I have no patience whatsoever where Melanie’s books are concerned…) and I can assure you that you DO NOT want to miss The Princess Spy! Of course you shouldn’t miss ANY of Melanie’s books but The Princess Spy is just the latest in a long line of Fantastic books!

I am excited to see Margaretha’s story being told and I have to say that this is certainly the best yet! …at least as far as this series is concerned!

There were so many things in the story that I never would have seen coming, which makes for an intriguing and fast-paced adventure full of surprises and unexpected plot-twists – one thing Melanie does very well!


The Princess Spy is also an outstanding Christian Fairy Tale!

A fairy tale like no other before it. No silly magic or nonsense, just good, strong Christian values and excellent story-telling.

As usual, Melanie has found the right way to retell the classic fairy tale with a Christian worldview (which is much more believable anyway for that time period) and making the story one that I, and many other moms I’m sure, will be thrilled to pass on for generations to come!

While I am always a little sad when a new chapter of this wonderful journey is over, I’m thrilled to have five wonderful books that I can read over and over… again and again.


God Bless you Melanie Dickerson! Keep up the GREAT writing!

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Age Appropriate For: 13 and up for mild romance and mild violence
Best for Ages: 13 and up

I didn’t think that any of Dickerson’s book would ever come close to The Captive Maiden. After all, I love Cinderella, and her retelling of that story was just so wonderful. However, The Princess Spy has taken the spot of my #1 favorite fairy-tale book.

Margaretha was my favorite female character in all of Dickerson’s books, maybe even one of my top 10 of the year. She had so much spunk and fire, while still being lady-like. Too often, when writers write about spunky girls, they make them tom-boys. Margaretha was a wonderful exception. I loved her fault of talking too much at times, and how Dickerson wove that into the story.

Colin was pretty awesome himself. Some readers might remember his grandparents from the book The Merchant’s Daughter. He had come to Germany from England to avenge the death of a friend, only to find his enemy threatening the only person that spoke English, Margaretha.

I don’t think that I have read a book that did as good a job showing the difficulties of the language barrier. Margaretha constantly has to repeat things in English for Colin, and there are some words that she doesn’t know in English (which is often humorous).

I don’t think I have laughed so hard with any of Dickerson’s books. Not only did the difference in language make for some very funny scenes, but Colin and Margaretha where just the perfect mix for humor. I laughed so much during this book that a couple of my siblings said that they had to read the book as soon as I finished. However, even though it was funny in parts, it also kept me on the edge of my seat wondering what was coming next

I loved the faith element in this story, and the romance was even sweeter than normal. Colin’s love for Margaretha, despite her faults, was so wonderful.

I highly recommend this book to those who love fairytales, romance, and exciting stories that keep you turning pages.

I received this book from Zondervan in exchange for my honest review. I was under no obligation to write a positive review. The opinions in this review are entirely my own.

[Tricia Mingerink · Rating 5 out of 5]

As with all her books, Dickerson weaves a deft tale combining the fairy tale and her historical setting. The Christian themes in the book are given a light touch, but they are still present throughout the book. My favorite part about this book is the character of Margaretha. Unlike some of the female main characters in Dickerson’s other books, Margaretha is not a lady to wait around for someone to rescue her. She is strong without being too bold. Her character has a good balance that shows it is possible to be a strong woman while still relying on others for help.

[Hannah Currie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. The main character, Princess Margaretha, continually surprised me with her spunk and creativity amidst what would have broken most people. Definitely the sort of person you'd want on your side in a crisis! The story was sweet and the setting so well-written that it felt like being transported back to the middle ages.

[Lou Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exciting medieval retelling of the Princess and the frog. The story had adventure, intrigue and romance. One of my favourite books from this series.

[Jen]

My thanks to NetGalley and Zondervan for an eARC of this book to read and review.

I am 100% in a book slump and this book is innocent and a victim of my slump. I have had it for a while and the urge to make a decision on it came over me and I decided to sit down and read it.

And then I started it and couldn't get past 2% of it.

It is NOT this book's fault. This is completely mine. I have decided to throw in the towel and will be marking this as a DNF and not giving a star rating to it, out of fairness.

Please don't get me wrong, there are books so horrible out there that after 2%, they DESERVE a star rating, but not this one.

Please don't let my book slump color your desire to read this. The cover is lovely and it is a loose fairy tale retelling, which is usually catnip for me. I just couldn't get into it.

[Rosie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’ll be discussing spoilers throughout, so beware.

The Princess Spy tells the story of Colin, a young Englishman who finds himself in Germany, and Margaretha, a highborn German lady. The story begins when Colin is attacked by a group of ruffians and left for dead. Tired, wounded, and on the brink of death, Colin stumbles through the countryside until he collapses at Hagenheim Castle, the home of Lady Margaretha. When he awakens, he finds that the only person who speaks his language—English—is Margaretha. Although Margaretha finds herself attracted to Colin, Colin is determined to leave Hagenheim as soon as possible and Margaretha is on the verge of marriage to Lord Claybrook. It seems Colin and Margaretha will go their separate ways until Margaretha uncovers a sinister plot that threatens her life, her family, and everyone she loves.

Does that sound intriguing? It does to me. But I’m not going to lie, I feel a little duped. The Princess Spy lures the reader in with the promise of intrigue, mystery, and, you know, spying. I think it’s also supposed to be a retelling of The Frog Prince. Unfortunately, it makes a lot of promises it can’t keep.



For a book called The Princess Spy, I would expect a decent amount of spying—maybe at least two or three times, right? But Margaretha only really spies on someone once, relays the information to Colin, then lets him take the lead from there. Not really enough to put "spy" in the title if you ask me.

As for being a retelling of The Frog Prince, I honestly would not have guessed the Frog Prince fairytale had anything to do with the story if I hadn’t read the description on Amazon. Admittedly, as fodder for a fairytale retelling, Frog Prince doesn’t really leave a whole lot to play with, but Dickerson ignores what little there is. At its most basic level, the story of the Frog Prince usually has a spoiled princess who transforms the frog into a handsome prince. While Margaretha is repeatedly referred to as a chatterbox and a flibbertigibbet, that’s not the same thing as spoiled, and as far as I can tell, neither Margaretha nor Colin undergoes any sort of transformation. The best I can give it is that Colin wears a froggy-green outfit for a while because the laundress messed up some dyes…? Um, yeah. The “fairytale retelling” aspect of this story is pretty much reduced to a couple of oblique references thrown in for fun.

I would actually be fine with this if the plot made up for it in other areas. I mean, if Dickerson made a nod to The Frog Prince and then carried on with an unrelated but rollicking good tale, that would be okay. But unfortunately, the plot is… weak. Really weak. In the words of Bilbo Baggins:



I genuinely am baffled over how this book actually got published since there’s so little plot to be found. I’m basically going to spoil the whole thing here, so you have been warned.

Anyways, as I mentioned earlier, Margaretha is about to accept a marriage proposal, but Colin appears and warns her that her suitor, Lord Claybrook, can’t be trusted because he got a girl pregnant and killed her back in England. Even though she thinks he's crazy, Margaretha is slightly concerned, spies on Lord Claybrook and conveniently overhears him summarize his evil plot to take over Hagenheim. And even though this was super contrived, I was on board at this point, I really was. Colin was already getting on my nerves and Margaretha’s continual insistence that she talked too much was getting old, but I figured, hey, this is salvageable. Maybe they’ll scare off Claybrook and follow him back to England and we'll find out more about the girl Claybrook killed.

Nope. Colin and Margaretha wander around the castle and the forest for a while, get themselves into a series of scrapes, have a confrontation with some ruffians that is straight out of Ever After, adopt an orphan (yes, really), find Margaretha’s dad and drag him back to the castle, and… the end. Oh, and Colin gets conked on the head and has a concussion. This is important, because it means that Margaretha has to continually recap their previous escapades.



Yes. Really. The plot is that thin.

It would be one thing if the plot was weak because it took a backseat to oh, say, character development… but no. There’s really no character development either. I was especially disappointed by Margaretha, as she initially seems like she’s going to be a likeable character, but after practically every conversational exchange, she stops to apologize because she “knows she talks too much.” Colin remains pretty static throughout the book. He begins as a jerk who can’t stand Margaretha. He ends as a jerk in love with Margaretha. There are some super awkward descriptions of how they’re starting to find each other attractive before they admit they like each other. I checked out at the point when Colin was boosting Margaretha onto her horse and was so overcome with emotion that he accidentally chucked her over the other side.



Seeing as this book is marketed to Christian teens, I would have expected a little more internal struggle and conflict here, but Colin and Margaretha are both depicted as strong Christians with unwavering faith throughout the story. Now, I’m happy to see characters with strong, grounded faith, and it’s rare to see this in a YA book. However, the way Dickerson writes it, it all feels a little bit like it’s part of the fairytales she’s retelling—the characters just “know” or “feel” that things will be okay. They don’t really doubt or question, they always do the right thing, and they’re just a little too perfect. As other reviewers have pointed out, Dickerson’s portrayal of Colin and Margaretha’s Christianity is anachronistic, given that the book takes place a good 100 years before the Protestant Reformation. Considering that the characters are so religious, I would expect more Roman Catholic language to be incorporated into the story, but it all feels a little 21st-century evangelical.

Even though this book is marketed to teens, it feels like the lower end of the teenage spectrum. I think maybe tweens or young teens (probably capped off at 16 max) would enjoy this book, but the characters’ one-dimensionality really begins to grow irritating. I read Dickerson’s debut novel, The Healer’s Apprentice, when it first came out about nine years ago. I was fifteen or so, and I recall genuinely enjoying the story at the time. As a fairly sheltered teen, I was just starting to choose my own books, and The Healer’s Apprentice was one of those rarest-of-rare finds: a clean, Christian, medieval romance. Something must have changed between then and now—either in my taste in books or in Dickerson’s writing. I think The Healer’s Apprentice was better than The Princess Spy, but I honestly can’t say for sure. All I know is it’s disappointing that such subpar work is being promoted considering how little Christian fantasy is offered to teens. If you’re a teenager looking for Christian YA fantasy, please, do yourself a favor and check out Anne Elisabeth Stengl’s “Tales of Goldstone Wood” series. It is a fantastic, well-written story filled with complicated plots and multi-faceted characters. I'm sad to say it, but the Hagenheim books probably aren't worth your time.

[✧*̥˚ Jordyn *˚✧ · Rating 5 out of 5]

“𝓞 𝓕𝓪𝓽𝓱𝓮𝓻 𝓖𝓸𝓭, 𝓘 𝓴𝓷𝓸𝔀 𝓷𝓸𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓲𝓼 𝓲𝓶𝓹𝓸𝓼𝓼𝓲𝓫𝓵𝓮 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓨𝓸𝓾. 𝓘 𝓪𝓶 𝓷𝓸𝓽 𝓹𝓾𝓽𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓶𝔂 𝓯𝓪𝓲𝓽𝓱 𝓲𝓷 𝓪𝓷𝔂𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓫𝓾𝓽 𝓨𝓸𝓾 — 𝓷𝓸𝓽 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓶𝓸𝓷𝓮𝔂 𝓲𝓷 𝓶𝔂 𝓹𝓾𝓻𝓼𝓮, 𝓷𝓸𝓻 𝓶𝔂 𝓼𝓽𝓪𝓽𝓾𝓼 𝓪𝓼 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓭𝓪𝓾𝓰𝓱𝓽𝓮𝓻 𝓸𝓯 𝓪 𝓭𝓾𝓴𝓮, 𝓷𝓸𝓽 𝓲𝓷 𝓒𝓸𝓵𝓲𝓷’𝓼 𝓪𝓫𝓲𝓵𝓲𝓽𝔂 𝓽𝓸 𝓹𝓻𝓸𝓽𝓮𝓬𝓽 𝓶𝓮, 𝓷𝓸𝓻 𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓷 𝓲𝓷 𝓶𝔂𝓼𝓮𝓵𝓯. 𝓜𝔂 𝓯𝓪𝓲𝓽𝓱 𝓲𝓼 𝓲𝓷 𝓨𝓸𝓾. 𝓨𝓸𝓾 𝓪𝓻𝓮 𝓶𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽𝔂 𝓽𝓸 𝓼𝓪𝓿𝓮, 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝓘 𝔀𝓲𝓵𝓵 𝓷𝓸𝓽 𝔀𝓪𝓿𝓮𝓻 𝓲𝓷 𝓶𝔂 𝓯𝓪𝓲𝓽𝓱. 𝓘 𝓴𝓷𝓸𝔀 𝓨𝓸𝓾 𝓬𝓪𝓻𝓮 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓶𝓮, 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝓷𝓸𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓲𝓼 𝓽𝓸𝓸 𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓭 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓨𝓸𝓾.”

» Wow. Just, wow.
Like many people I've found myself in love with this series, with the lush medieval setting, the ever present battles of good vs evil, and the inspiring characters. It amazes me how Mrs. Melanie Dickerson has written (11?) books within mostly the same bloodline while making them each memorable and different but with the mix of faith and fairytales.

» This book was a lot more fast paced in comparison to the other books, a quality I much enjoyed. And I, as always, enjoyed the faith elements. The Princess Spy was a retelling of The Frog and the Princess. This retelling is clean, Christian/Catholic at times and does not include magic (except in use of the villians in The Healer's Apprentice). And as The Frog and the Princess usually is based upon a solid amount of magic I'd imagine it quite hard to write a retelling without it. I appreciate the lack of spells and magic, but I also cannot say that it had a heavy amount of "Frog" in it. There were certain elements that placed Colin as "the frog" and the ending wrapped that all up, but it's not as heavily prevalent as the fairytale twists in Melanie's other books. Personally, this didn't really affect me and I still loved this book

“𝒽𝑒 𝒽𝒶𝒹 𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓃𝓈𝒻𝑜𝓇𝓂𝑒𝒹, 𝒻𝓇𝑜𝓂 “𝐹𝓇𝑜𝓈𝒸𝒽𝒿𝓊𝓃𝑔𝑒,” 𝑜𝓇 “𝐹𝓇𝑜𝑔 𝒷𝑜𝓎,” 𝓉𝑜 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝓋𝑒𝓇𝓎 𝑜𝓌𝓃 𝓀𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒾𝓃 𝓈𝒽𝒾𝓃𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒶𝓇𝓂𝑜𝓇.”

» This book felt similar to The Captive Maiden, with certain elements of the plot being shared, however it felt like it's own book and it's own take on what the differences are with a different couple. I loved the aspect of different languages and how realistic and how much variation it added to this story. I also liked how the couple protected themselves until they were sure that a marriage could be in the future. But it was also very cool to see the discussion of the love of family and leaving a family for the love of a partner.

🐸 Overall, it was a book I obviously enjoyed. And if you're looking to read/listen to this story I definitely recommend the audiobook bc the narrator is talented and really brings this story so much character in my opinion 😊

Content: Light mention of a young woman who was pregnant before marriage, characters grieve the loss of friends/family, a kiss (non described), talk of characters fighting back the urge to kiss

[deborah o'carroll · Rating 5 out of 5]

In THE PRINCESS SPY, Melanie Dickerson delivers another wonderful book--beautiful inside and out! (That cover. Seriously. It's one of my favorites.) I was a little worried the story inside could not live up to the gorgeous cover, but it did. Oh, did it ever.

One of my favorite things had to be the fact that the hero is from England and speaks no German, but finds himself in Germany where nobody speaks English--except the heroine, who only speaks a little. Everything resulting from that basic premise was alternately fun, hilarious, awesome, and sweet. I must say the author did a fabulous job of presenting the struggles of a foreigner in a land where he doesn't understand anyone, and vice versa. Colin and Margaretha's relationship having to do with the language barrier was absolutely adorable. I LOVED that aspect to the story! That alone makes THE PRINCESS SPY a favorite.

As far as Margaretha herself, I enjoyed her as a heroine, which is a compliment to the author, who must be one of the best writers of girl main characters, because I actually like the heroines in all the books I've read by her. One of my main problems with reading stories with a romantic tilt to them (or, any book, actually...), is loving the male character but finding the girl annoying, unlikeable, or, in certain cases, hating her. So I'm glad that Margaretha was actually likeable, and fun, and it's amusing how talkative she is.

And then Colin. Yes, once again there is an awesome hero who we fall in love with a little... or more than a little... I think it took me a bit longer to get a feel for him as a character (instead of instantly knowing his character like with Gabe and Valten) but in another way I loved him from the first I saw him! So... I don't know. Suffice it to say I loved every minute (page?) with him and wished the story was longer so I could read more about him!

Now, I did feel like the fairytale-retelling aspect of it was not the strongest. In the other two books I've read by Melanie Dickerson, one of my favorite things about them was the fairytale part. As a retelling of the Frog Prince, it seemed to be grasping a little, almost as if it was forced into the story for the sake of being called a retelling. Yes, there's a scene involving something dropped in a well, and the character gets called Frog-boy briefly because of some unfortunate green clothes, but that's all I noticed (though I might be missing something). Then again, there's not much to the original Frog Prince story anyway.

The title seemed slightly forced as well. The spying wasn't too much of a focus except very early on, and Margaretha is technically a duke's daughter and not a princess... But at the end of the day neither of those nit-picks matters much because, regardless, the story is awesome. Even without a strong fairytale plot, the book was good in itself and I really loved it.

The experience of reading THE PRINCESS SPY will be enriched by reading the other books in the series first--for instance I may have squealed in delight whenever there was a reference to Gabe from THE FAIREST BEAUTY, or whenever Valten (the hero of THE CAPTIVE MAIDEN) came on the scene... And I've yet to read THE HEALER'S APPRENTICE or THE MERCHANT'S DAUGHTER, but I can tell that they would add to the story if I had read them already (soon, I hope!). But really, I think THE PRINCESS SPY stands alone fairly well.

Bottom line: With an interesting and exciting story, beautiful writing, and characters we love, THE PRINCESS SPY is thoroughly worth reading (as long as you don't expect there to be too much of a fairytale retelling or a whole lot of spying). It's a really good tale for anyone, but especially for older teens and lovers of a good fairytale-esque romance adventure in the forests and castles of medieval Germany. I enjoyed it a ton, and I can't wait to read more by Melanie Dickerson!

(I would like to thank the author and Zondervan for the copy of this book they sent me in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review; these opinions are my own.)

Review originally posted at: http://deborahocarroll.wordpress.com/...

[Camille · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve really been enjoying Melanie Dickerson’s Christian take on fairy tales, so I was eager to see how she adapted one of my favorites, especially considering the heroine was one of my favorite side characters from The Captive Maiden. While the elements from The Frog Prince, while present, were severely lacking, The Princess Spy was still an enjoyable story.

I adored Margaretha. She was such a sweet and delightful character, loyal and compassionate, with an innocent and romantic heart and the tendency to chatter. She began the story rather sheltered and experienced a lot of growth throughout the adventure she quickly finds herself in. I really liked Colin as well. He's good and humble, with a strong sense of justice, not to mention he’s a sweetheart. He and Margaretha had an adorable relationship that began with friendship and gradually deepens into something more. Their language barrier provided an often humorous obstacle, and their genuine caring for one another despite their faults, as well their attempts to protect one another's feelings, were both extremely sweet. Their romance was utterly adorable.

The plot was full of a lot of action and intrigue—spying and suspense, a suitor who is not who he seems who concocts a wicked scheme, and an adventure to try and protect one's family. I normally find journey plots tedious but found this one engaging, probably because the couple was so cute. I also adored the medieval setting with its reoccurring characters from previous books in the series and overall fairy tale feel. The faith element was masterfully woven throughout the story, with an excellent Christian message—trust God, for nothing is too hard for him. Beautiful.

Overall, The Princess Spy was both fun, adorable, and romantic. It’s one of my favorite Melanie Dickerson fairy tales.