Princess Pulverizer Series

Author: Nancy Krulik
Illustrator: Ben Balistreri (Books 1-4), Justin Rodrigues (Books 5-6), Ian McGinty (Books 7-8)

© Date: 2018 – 2020
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Pages (Book 1): 132
Chapters: Yes
Illustrations: Yes, most page layouts have an illustration
Publisher Recommended Age: 6-8
Bonus Activities at End of Book: No

Summary from Book One: Princess Serena (or Princess Pulverizer, as she prefers) doesn’t want to be a princess-she wants to be a knight! But first she must complete a Quest of Kindness and prove she has what it takes to be a hero.

When a mysterious thief steals a queen’s jewels, Princess Pulverizer knows that retrieving them is the perfect good deed to begin her path to knighthood. But can she save the day by herself?

Note: This review is a whole series, so it is long.

Page Pig Thoughts: Admittedly, I was disappointed to discover that Ursula Vernon would not be writing any more “Hamster Princess” books. So I was thrilled to find this series about a princess dreaming of saving others rather than being distressed in a tower or rescued by a knight. Although Princess Pulverizer is much less sarcastic and more appropriate for younger readers.

Amidst the witty word play and fun adventures, I found this series had many elements to enjoy. I loved the idea of a Quest of Kindness, I am now imagining a world where more people are on those types of quests. I am a big fan of finding where you fit in, even if it is not where you originally thought that you should be. I appreciated that the main characters had their somewhat far-fetched dreams come to fruition. I adored the illustrations that had their own humor and really added to the stories. I was amused that Princess Pulverizer dreamed of stomping around in a clunky suit of armor rather than traipsing around in a pointless tiara. I also appreciated that Princess Pulverizer stayed true to herself, but was still able to become less selfish and more patient along the way.

As we neared the last book, I wondered if the series would be wrapped up or be left open. I was pleasantly surprised to find a series ending that played on the series beginning, but left the characters in a good place. How lovely that the end of the Quest of Kindness was also kind to the readers who enjoyed the books.

Family Unit: Princess Pulverizer finds her home of sorts with the traveling companions that she meets along the way.

Princess Pulverizer is the daughter of King Alexander, no mention of any other family members.
Lucas is a knight-in-training that left Knight School because the other guys nicknamed him Lucas the Lily-Livered. He is afraid of most everything.
Dribble was kicked out of his lair by the other dragons because he wants to use his fire for making grilled cheese sandwiches, not burn down villages.

Conflict/Social Issues:

At times, Dribble keeps Princess Pulverizer in check, which leads to a few minor disagreements.
Princess Pulverizer learns to be a better version of herself, so she has some internal realizations along the way.
Dribble is constantly bogged down by the stigma that dragons are scary; all he wants to do is make everyone grilled cheese sandwiches.
Lucas is commonly referred to as lily-livered, a nickname that he eventually sheds as he becomes more confident in himself. Princess Pulverizer and Dribble never call him that, but the name is referenced to explain his nature.

Positive Items:

A Quest of Kindness. A kid making her mission to help others in need, amazingly positive.
Princess Pulverizer is on a Quest of Kindness. Lucas the knight-in-training and Dribble the dragon join Princess Pulverizer. They all discover that they make a good, unstoppable team. At points during the Quest, each one shines.
The Quest of Kindness helps Princess Pulverizer learn to think of others and find patience.
Princess Pulverizer never gives up on her dream to go to Knight School. After successfully completing her Quest of Kindness, her father, King Alexander, allows her to go to Knight School. Although he did have to think about it because Princess Pulverizer disobeyed his order to only go as far as the ocean, not into the ocean, on her Quest of Kindness. She honestly admitted to him that she sailed out to sea on a pirate ship to save a mermaid and her friends from danger. Princess Pulverizer had learned honesty on her Quest, and it didn’t get in the way of her Knight School dreams.
Lucas finds his bravery for many situations before the trio earn a magical bravery pendant. The series ends with Lucas having the nickname “Brave Buccaneer” at Knight School in Empiria.
Even though people keep running away from the “scary” dragon, Dribble continues following his calling to become a chef. The series ends with Dribble being a chef at Knight School in Empiria.

Items of Interest:

The villains may be a little scary for a younger, sensitive reader. The villains are a bit silly, but the suspense of not knowing if things will work out and the nature of the villains mean that if you are the parent of a younger, sensitive reader, you may want to at least look at the pictures in the first book.
This series is about two kids and a dragon adventuring around on their own doing good deeds and outsmarting/fighting bad guys.
Princess Pulverizer’s given name is Princess Serena. She decides that does not describe who she is, so she insists that everyone call her Princess Pulverizer instead. Her father is not so sure about the name change, but tries to be supportive.
The series has a focus on eating grilled cheese sandwiches, so your kid may learn about various kinds of smelly cheese and maybe want to try them.
Book One- Grilled Cheese and Dragons – The opening scene has Princess Pulverizer swinging from the rafters and falling into pudding, which is very frowned upon in the Royal School of Ladylike Manners. Princess Pulverizer begs her father to go to knight school. He says she can eventually, but first she has to complete a Quest of Kindness and do eight good deeds. So she ventures out on her own to find people that need helping, she finds a first task of recovering a queen’s jewels. A huge, smelly ogre has been taking treasures from people. Princess Pulverizer demands to become his prisoner to recover the queen’s jewels. Much to her grumpiness, Lucas and Dribble attempt to rescue her. Princess Pulverizer never loses her bravery, and rescues herself, Lucas, Dribble, and the jewels from the ogre.
Book Two – Worse, Worser, Wurst – The Wizard of Wurst has kidnapped a town’s jester. The wizard is a bit of the worst, he turned an entire army into worms, he kidnapped a jester, he turned a boy into a pigeon, and turns princes into frogs. Princess Pulverizer demands to be his apprentice to sneak into his castle, but she needs help from Dribble and Lucas to free the jester and escape the wizard’s tower.
Book Three – Bad Moooove – A troll steals all of a town’s cows, goats, and sheep. The troll is master over a griffin and makes a giant stinky, cheese monster. The mean troll intends to be troll king, despite having pink hair, not green. Princess Pulverizer and Lucas were taken prisoner by the troll, even Princess Pulverizer was about to get scared in the troll’s dark cave with threats of becoming the troll and griffin’s dinner. The trio manages to melt the cheese monster, which traps the troll. Princess Pulverizer is humbled into learning that milking and herding animals is tricky business. Dribble manages to keep Princess Pulverizer’s ego in check a bit.
Book Four – Quit Buggin’ Me – A lying, selfish knight kidnaps and imprisons a few townspeople and makes up a story about a beast to keep the townspeople out of an apple orchard so that he can have all the apples. The knight takes Lucas and Dribble prisoner. A magical arrow teaches Princess Pulverizer that Lucas and Dribble are her family/home on her Quest for Kindness. Her father, King Alexander, had once said that home is where your family is, and there are all kinds of families. Princess Pulverizer makes a piñata of bugs to take advantage of the knight’s fear of crawling things, and free his prisoners. Princess Pulverizer has a sword fight with the knight, but he winds up defeated by a constricting snake. Princess Pulverizer saves the knight from the snake, but ties him up and leaves him under a tree to be watched over by Dribble while she jumps into the large hole that Lucas fell into. Princess Pulverizer and Lucas wind up saving each other at points during their escape from the mole king and his chubby moles.
Book Five – Watch that Witch – A town has twin witches. One witch is kind and uses her magic to bring joy because happy people mean a peaceful place. Once witch is selfish and uses her magic to divide and conquer, she takes what she wants when she wants, no matter who it hurts. The evil witch wants to rule the land, and takes advantage of Princess Pulverizer’s desire to be a knight and lack of patience. The evil witch uses a magical brooch to hypnotize Princess Pulverizer into doing mean deeds as her knight. Princess Pulverizer is injured in a jousting match against a skilled knight. Princess Pulverizer winds up a prisoner in the evil witch’s castle. Dribble, Lucas, and the good witch rescue Princess Pulverizer from the castle. Princess Pulverizer, Lucas, and Dribble then trick the evil witch into looking into a magical reflecting pool where the evil witch is then turned to stone. The good witch feels badly that her sister never learned how good it feels to be kind. Since the stone statue evil witch was not going anywhere, the good witch make statues of Princess Pulverizer, Dribble, and Lucas standing beside the stone evil witch. The statues are to remind the townspeople that good always triumphs over evil.
Book Six – The Dragon’s Tale – A juggler is lousy at his job (he never practices) and gets trash thrown at him when he performs. He dumps the garbage into the river. The townspeople are unaware of their polluted water source, so they believe some sort of flu is going around causing their stomach distress. The lousy juggler tricks Princess Pulverizer into luring a unicorn into a clearing. The lousy juggler traps the unicorn so he can charge people for unicorn viewing. The lousy juggler challenges Princess Pulverizer to prove her honesty to townspeople that don’t know her. The unicorn is thankful to Princess Pulverizer, Lucas, and Dribble for freeing it from a cage, so it comes back to prove the lousy juggler as the liar and culprit of polluting the river. Early in the story, Dribble was happily running a restaurant because the happy grilled cheese eating people did not know who the identity of the chef behind the trees. Poor Dribble later winds up disguised as a tree because townspeople are afraid of him. At the end of the story, the townspeople have forgiven Dribble for accidentally burning down a barn (polluted river stomach distress caused a belch that let out a flame). Dribble then happily makes grilled cheese sandwiches for the townspeople while they clean up the river with Princess Pulverizer’s and Lucas’s help. This story ends on a cliff hangar because the Princess Pulverizer, Dribble, and Lucas go on a quest to find the family of the unicorn. While the unicorn was trapped, his family moved on somewhere.
Book Seven – Gotta Warn the Unicorns – Princess Pulverizer, Dribble, and Lucas are out searching for Fortune the unicorn’s family/herd. Princess Pulverizer attempts to visit a king’s castle as Princess Serena to collect information on possible unicorn whereabouts, but was struggling to be a proper princess. A super fearful king believes that he is getting poisoned at mealtime (he has an obsession for beans, maybe those cause the stomach distress), so he wants a unicorn horn to ensure that his meals are poison free. When she sees the king with what he believed to be a unicorn horn, Princess Pulverizer couldn’t keep her know-it-all mouth closed and tells the king that isn’t a unicorn horn. The afraid of everything king sends his soldiers out to collect a unicorn horn because an old unicorn had been spotted outside the castle. Princess Pulverizer still couldn’t keep her mouth shut, so the king sends his soldiers to collect lots of unicorn horns. Princess Pulverizer leaves the castle to find Lucas and Dribble so they can not only find Fortune the unicorn’s family, but save them from the king’s soldiers. After saving the unicorn herd, the traveling trio manage to convince the king that he does not need unicorn horns because flowers have all the healing abilities that he needs.
Book Eight – Yo-Ho, Yo…No! – Princess Pulverizer, Dribble, and Lucas find a snarky mermaid trapped in a net. The trio attempts to save her and winds up prisoners on the pirate ship that trapped the mermaid. The female pirate captain is mean, she has her own father working the nastiest job on the ship, a deck swabber on a ship called the Seasick Soaker for a reason. Princess Pulverizer is a bit conflicted because she realizes that by sailing on the sea, she is disobeying her father’s orders to keep her Quest of Kindness on the land. Princess Pulverizer decides to forego a chance to swim to freedom to save Dribble, Lucas, and the mermaid from the pirates. Princess Pulverizer winds up challenging the captain to a duel to save Dribble and Lucas from walking the plank to their doom. The Quest of Kindness has wiped away Princess Pulverizer’s selfishness, she tells Dribble and Lucas to escape the ship and cut the mermaid’s net while she is sword fighting. Princess Pulverizer’s arms are bound as she winds up falling off the plank (punishment for the other’s escape), but she is saved by Dribble and Lucas. The trio go to Empiria where Princess Pulverizer gets to tell her father, the king, about her Quest of Kindness. The series ends with a scene reminiscent of the series start, Princess Pulverizer is swinging from the rafters and falls into pudding. But the series is wrapped up nicely with happy endings for all.

Books in Series (At Time of Posting):

Book One – Grilled Cheese and Dragons
Book Two – Worse, Worser, Wurst
Book Three – Bad Moooove!
Book Four – Quite Buggin’ Me
Book Five – Watch that Witch
Book Six – The Dragon’s Tale
Book Seven – Gotta Warn the Unicorns
Book Eight – Yo-Ho, Yo…No!