What can I say; this was a quick, easy, enjoyable read. From the moment I picked it up, I couldn’t put it down. It wasn’t an overly long book, but I did manage to finish it the same day I started reading it.
The Ugly Princess is written by Henderson Smith (who also happens to be from my home state of Montana). It is a fun and refreshing new kind of Fairy Tale, based around the lore of the Winnowwood. The Winnowwood are spectacular women, given magic and healing powers. However, whenever these powers are used the women get new warts or disfigurements to their faces causing them to become hideously ugly the more powerful that they are. There is one way out of this ugliness, but to take this loop-hole, one must give up these powers.
The heroine of the story is Princess Olive who reminds us in a whole new way that beauty really is in the eye of the beholder, and that true beauty lies within. I have to admit that the further I got into the story, regardless of how ugly Olive was described as being, I had a hard time seeing her that way in my mind. I think I must have seen her the way the animals did.
I give this book 5 out of 5 stars. Henderson did an amazing job of writing a story that was just plain fun to read. Princess Olive is an unlikely heroine and we get to travel with her in her adventures and when she can really learn how to have confidence in who she is. There are many great friends to Olive and even a dysfunctional family situation that has you rooting for Olive throughout the story. We learn not to judge to quickly on many fronts, and to trust our intuition through the eyes and thoughts of Olive. I loved this story and would even read it again, it was so fun! I would love to see a sequel in the making. *I have recently been informed by the author that a sequel IS in the works!
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