Wide Awake Princess, by E.D. Baker

This week I finished reading a great book called Wide Awake Princess, by E.D. Baker.  The novel tells the story of Princess Annabelle (Princess Annie to her friends).  Annie is the younger sister for Princess Gwendolyn (aka Sleeping Beauty).  The only catch to Annie's life is that she has absolutely no magical gifts or abilities.  She is not magically beautiful, gifted or smart.  She is just a regular girl.  Sort of - see, Annie has the ability to "hear" magic (twinkling bells) and anyone who is near her loses their magic.  Annie gets to see the true person among all of the enchanted royals in the land.

Princess Gwendolyn pricks her finger on a tiny spinning wheel that was smuggled into the castle on her sixteenth birthday.  Everyone in the castle immediately falls asleep...except Annie.  Annie knows of the curse placed upon her sister and that her family must sleep for one hundred years.  That is, unless Annie does something about it.  She decides to set on a journey to find all the princes she can who can come kiss her sister.  She also wants to find the fairy who created the curse to find out if there is anything she can do to shorten the sleeping time.

Annie is accompanied on her journey by a young guard named Liam.  They become fast friends as they do all they can to help save the kingdom.  Annie and Liam meet many interesting fairy-tale characters.  During the course of their journey, Annie and Liam encounter "Beauty and the Beast", Hanzel and Gretel, the Frog Prince and become part of the Princess and the Pea story. 

This is a great story in the vein of "Fractured Fairy Tales" from Rocky and Bullwinkle.  I really enjoyed reading this book.  I definitely recommend Wide Awake Princess to all fairy-tale lovers - both young and young at heart!