A review by whatsthestorywishbone
Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

5.0

We listened to this as an honor selection for newbery bingo. We enjoyed it and found it engaging. It wasn’t perfect but in the scope of newbery books this was one of the better ones. I was worried at first that it would be too similar to Elle enchanted and we would get them confused reading them so close together but after the first few chapters it differentiates itself. I felt like this book was split in two sections: before the ball and after the ball. While Reid said he liked the post ball stuff better he also admitted that section was a bit scary. I kind of hated the main reader in the full cast audiobook production, so might not listen to that version again. I will also say that the story is a low key love story so I might recommend it for kids a bit older than six but it’s petty tame so I think that stuff goes over a younger kids head, maybe 8-10 is the best age?