The Wide-Awake Princess

Author: E.D. Baker
Illustrator: Kimberly Bender

© Date: 2010
Publisher: Bloomsbury Books
Pages: 261
Chapters: Yes
Illustrations: No, just a map at the beginning
Publisher Recommended Age: 10 years and up
Bonus Activities at End of Book: Reading group questions

Summary from Book: What if Sleeping Beauty had a sister?

When Princess Gwen pricks her finger and sends the whole castle to sleep, only one person is left awake: her little sister, Princess Annie, who has never been affected by magic. Now it’s up to Annie to venture beyond the castle walls and get help. To break the spell, she must find Gwen’s true love.

As she heads out into her fairy-tale world, Annie discovers that she doesn’t need magic to outsmart the witch who captured Hansel and Gretel. And she’s resistant to the enchanted dust meant to trap her in a fairy ring. But the forest also holds dangers that require magical defenses. Can Annie find a prince for her sister and make her way back to the castle without magic?

Page Pig Thoughts: While I quite enjoyed this story, check out the Items of Interest below to know if it is appropriate for your child.

I haven’t read a romance novel in quite awhile, which made this one a pleasant change of pace. There is definitely adventure as Princess Annie goes searching for princes to wake her older sister with a kiss. But I found romance to be the overall theme, which seems appropriate for a fairy tale about princesses and princes. Princess Annie is not vain, not afraid to get dirty, and can take care of herself for the most part. But she also discovers her inner desire for someone to love her openly and honestly. She is an easy character to be fond of. Liam the kind and noble castle guard that goes with Princess Annie to keep her safe on her adventure is also a well done and likeable character.

Past the romance and likeable characters, the adventures have a fairy tale twist to them. The twists on the original fairy tales and the brief introduction of such a variety makes the story rather engaging. The book has several aspects that make it a fun read, particularly for slightly older readers that enjoy fairy tales and are developing romance interests.

Check out the items of interest, some parts of the story may not be appropriate for younger or sensitive readers.

Family Unit:

Princess Annabelle (Annie) lives in a castle with her older sister, Gwendolyn (age 16), and her mother (Queen Karolina) and father (King Halbert).
Liam is a recent castle guard, but he had been living in a castle with his older brother, Clarence, and his mother (Queen Lenore) and father (King).

Conflict/Social Issues:

The Kingdom of Treecrest had been trying to keep out spinning wheels so that Gwendolyn would not go to sleep for a hundred years.
Princess Annie is upset that everyone in the castle, including her family, could sleep longer than she lives. She wants to break the curse.
Princess Annie is not affected by magic. Being around her diminishes the magical gifts that were provided to others, so not everyone wants to be near her, including her family.
Liam is not treated well by his mother and brother.

Positive Items:

Princess Annie forges her own path to breaking the sleeping curse. She discovers her inner bravery to face evil witches, self-centered royals, and other unknown problems on her adventure.
Liam and Clarence have opposite personalities. Seeing the differences between the two really highlights the kindness and bravery of Liam.
Princess Annie and Liam have openness and honesty as the foundation of their friendship, then relationship.
Liam is willing to stand up to his mother and brother to do the right thing for Princess Annie and the Kingdom of Treecrest.

Items of Interest:

Level of romance – While adventuring around, Annie and Liam fall in love. He kisses her on the cheek. She enjoys snuggling in his arms, how his hand feels holding hers, and how he looks at her. The two have a healthy relationship built on open, honest conversations and watching out for each other. The story ends with Liam declaring that he doesn’t mind losing his magical gifts if it means being with her.
Liam had taken an oath to be a castle guard, which is his position when Annie meets him. After he kisses her on her cheek, she is frustrated that he would do such a thing and she has feelings for a commoner. Her parents would never approve of the match. When she finds out that he is actually a prince and had been lying about his identity, she is initially upset and doesn’t understand why he was sneaking around as a guard. But she does not stay upset for long, she remembers that he has been honest at all other times and gives him a chance to explain himself.
Liam took an oath to be a Treecrest castle guard despite being a prince of neighboring Dorinocco. He heard about his mother and older brother plotting how to take over Treecrest, and knew that whatever those two came up with would not be honorable. So he had gone to stop whatever his mother and brother were planning.
Princess Annie was given the gift of no magic touching her, bad or good. Her gift also means that the magical gift of anyone near her fades away. Her mother, father, and sister make her sit across the room or the end of the table because they fear that she could permanently take away their magical gifts. Annie’s gift also means that witches casting spells on her have the spell bounce back onto themselves.
Many people in the story were given magical gifts of beauty, or at least they really pride themselves on their appearances. Annie is frequently told that she is plain because she did not receive any magical beauty gifts.
Liam was not given many magical gifts because his mother made too many demands from the fairies when his older brother was born. His mother never ceases to remind him that he is a lesser son. Liam grew up mostly with his father, who taught him chivalry, honor, and useful skills like sword fighting.
Annie was upset that everyone in the castle may sleep for a hundred years and she may not see any of them awake anymore. She is also concerned that word will get out about the sleep and people with bad intentions will try to take over. Annie goes on a quest for the true love prince to kiss her sister and break the spell, but then realizes one prince may not be the right one, so she starts collecting unattached princes to kiss her sister.
Most of the princes are excited about the prospect of marrying Princess Gwendolyn because she is the most beautiful in all the lands.
Annie finds her way to a cottage in the woods where an old woman is feeding two small children. Annie realizes that the old woman will put the children in cages and make use of the recipes to cook children. She outsmarts the woman and escapes with the children.
Annie finds Prince Digby in his kingdom that is a little dirty and overrun. He is drunk at the tavern early in the morning, this is apparently normal for him. Barmaids are sitting on his knees. Liam helps sober him up. While he waits for Annie to return to Treecrest so he can kiss Gwendolyn, he spends his time at a tavern.
Annie wins a princess contest for the chance to marry Prince Andreas. He is initially excited about her winning. But when Annie tells him that she competed for the chance to take him to kiss her sister, he happily goes along with the plan because Gwendolyn is the prettiest in all the lands.
Liam tries helping a prince rescue his true love from an ogre. Turns out that Annie was needed to help dispel the magic, but the princess also was in love with the Ogre. So that prince decides to go try kissing Gwendolyn.
Annie finds a prince that had been turned into a frog, but was now human again. The princess that kissed him and turned him human found out that he was already married and dumped him to search for new frogs. The prince went looking for his family, but discovers his stepmother had given his wife a poisoned apple and sold his children to a woodcutter. The prince falls into despair and depression because his family is now gone. Turns out his children are the ones that Annie came across in the forest, so he is happily reunited with them.
Annie goes to the swamp of the evil witch that cast the curse on Gwendolyn. Annie is seeking help/verification how to break the sleep spell/curse. The witch’s home is kinda creepy and she tries to cast a spell on Annie, but it bounced back at her. The witch also realizes that her magic is diminishing while Annie is present. The witch winds up helping Annie under threat that Annie will set up camp and never leave if the witch tricks her or doesn’t help.
Annie gets kidnapped and locked in Rapunzel’s tower. Rapunzel is gone. A prince comes calling for Rapunzel and is disappointed that Annie is there instead. He is not capable of rescuing Annie, but says Rapunzel never wanted to be rescued because the witch who trapped her there would find out. The next day, a new prince comes calling on Rapunzel. He says Thursday is the day he visits. Annie finds out that he is married, apparently Rapunzel is unaware of that.
Annie creates a rope out of stray Rapunzel hairs to rappel out of the tower. She gets kinda close to the ground and starts to fall when a man on horseback catches her, Liam had rode up in the nick of time.
Liam had found Annie after tracking down the men that kidnapped her. The men happened to work for Liam’s mother.
Liam convinces Annie to go visit one more prince, which turns out to be his older brother, Clarence. This is when Annie finds out that Liam is a prince.
Clarence and Liam are not nice to each other. Clarence is sniveling, whiny, into himself, and in on his mother’s plot to take over other kingdoms.
Liam’s mother does not talk kindly with her son and sends Annie off to a room on her own. The Queen makes Annie sleep on a tower of mattresses. No, she didn’t get any sleep. Yes, she wonders why a pea was used because it could get smashed under the weight of the mattresses.
Liam’s mother is responsible for the tiny spinning wheel that Gwendolyn pricks her finger on before going to sleep.
Annie leads a line of princes to kiss her sister. Prince Digby tries kissing Gwendolyn repeatedly, so Annie lets go of his hand and Prince Digby falls asleep. Prince Andreas kisses Gwendolyn so passionately that Annie looks away. Prince Clarence tries pinching Gwendolyn, so he too is given the go to sleep treatment.
The prince who was turned into a bear, Prince Beldegard, had become friends with Annie in the forest. Beldegard is rather likeable and respectable. He had been watching over the children after they escaped the cottage. Later, he was helping watch over Clarence and keep him in line while they were traveling to Treecrest for the kissing moment. Prince Beldegard was not going to kiss Gwendolyn on account of him being a bear. When none of the princes’ kisses worked, Annie started crying, one of her tears fell on Gwendolyn’s face. Beldegard said that no one cries when they sleep, so he licks the tear off of her face, and Gwendolyn wakes up to a bear.
Gwendolyn was rather into appearances and had been pining after Prince Digby before she fell asleep. To her credit, she was a good sport about her true love being an enchanted prince that looks like a bear.
Extremely shortly after the castle is woken up, some of Liam’s mother’s men attack the castle of Treecrest. Clarence is with them.
Annie is fed up with the situation when Liam nearly gets run through with a sword. So Annie takes matters into her own hands and goes into the fight to take care of the magical components. The evil witch controlling the magic tries to cast a spell on Annie that bounces back at herself and turns herself into a wooden statue.
I rather enjoyed the charming cover illustration, but was disappointed when the text in the story said Annie had hair to her knees because that is not how she was depicted on the cover.
The reading group questions at the end had some interesting ones related to the magical gifts that were given to the princes and princesses maybe not being a good thing, and what magical gifts would you want.

Other Books in Series (At Time of Posting):

Book 2 – Unlocking the Spell
Book 3 – The Bravest Princess
Book 4 – Princess in Disguise
Book 5 – Princess Between Worlds
Book 6 – The Princess and The Pearl
Book 7 – Princess Before Dawn (review)

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