When I finished this book, I concluded it deserved two stars and logged into Goodreads to rate it accordingly. Imagine my surprise when I found that I had already read it five years ago... and rated it two stars. While I apparently have a mind like a sieve, at least I'm consistent. ( )

Good.

Not my favorite of the series but it is still good. Colin and Margaretha make a good pair. Toby sounds like a sweet boy. Looking forward to the next book! ( )

I have enjoyed all of Melanie Dickerson's books. Fairy-tale re-tellings are a favorite of mine. This one, I had muddled feelings about, and I will explain later.

The Positive (YAY!!!):
- I loved visiting Hagenheim and these characters from the very first book on. Especially the few moments with Valten and his wife.
- Colin is an admirable, passionate, wounded, lovable hero, and, looking past the first item in the list below, Margaretha is a believable heroine. Her personality rings very "true to life." Reminds me much of a friend of mine.
- The romance between these characters was sweet and natural. Colin is so protective and careful with her. Her shyness with him is cute and awkward and everything it's supposed to be. He shows initiative and chivalry in the relationship--something all but lost in our modern times.
- I was especially impressed with how the author handled the German/English translation situations. Also, learning bits of the language was exciting.
- Bits of this story, besides alluding to the Frog Prince, put me in mind of The Princess Bride, and the scripture passage of Christ's nativity. FUN!

The Negative (We'll get this out of the way.):
- The heroine ignores the fact a foreign man has been beaten and left for dead in her father's jurisdiction, even after he pleads with her to ask her father to help him. She thinks he is addled by his injuries, which were obviously maliciously inflicted, and she doesn't get legal help for him. This affected my sympathy for her.
- Also, there was a lot of telling vs. showing as well as "author-filter" words. "She felt. She heard. She saw." So much I was surprised to see it from this author. Therefore I wasn't as "into" the story in a lot of parts as I wanted to be.
- The kisses came across less emotional and more technical than I had hoped, given the build-up.
- I would have liked to see more setting detail. The characters spent more time in introspection than observing details in their surroundings. This one is just a personal preference of mine. The senses are used sparingly and most often used is the sense of touch. Though this may be in line with the characters' personalities.
- The villain's motive seemed foggy. At times it looked like he was just evil because the story needed a villain. I never understood why he was so hateful without provocation.

In summation: This is a good read, which I enjoyed. The author did a great job keeping peril in the back of the reader's mind. There is nothing like worrying for my favorite characters' lives and physical well-being to keep me turning the page! This story just didn't strike the chord some of the others did, which got them on my "read again" shelf. I'm looking forward to many more stories from this author. I hear she has plots in mind for "The Little Mermaid" and "Rapunzel!" Can't wait to see what she'll bring us with those.

***If you have never read this author, don't let this review discourage you. Try starting with "The Merchant's Daughter," or "The Captive Maiden." ( )

Review on blog here http://crossromance.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/new-release-princess-spy-melanie.html

The latest of Melanie Dickerson’s ‘Hagenhiem’ stories, as I call them, draws together the two settings with the protagonist as the grandson of Ranulf and Annabel from The Merchant’s Daughter. In some ways, I liked this better than the previous books, particularly at the start with the storyline of the stranger who didn’t speak the language, and the mystery behind Claybrook and the young girl lacking in confidence with her social hangups about talking too much and her believed inability to keep a secret. Some readers may really relate to this.

Perhaps also, I took a certain pleasure in the hero being English (like me) and the novel not vilifying all English people as some tend to- despite one or two cultural stereotypes. I don’t think England is anymore rainy or foggy than Germany, for instance, as Colin says, and the North Sea which separates the two countries is not an ‘ocean’. Aside from this, the device of spying and the sinister plot against Hagenhiem worked well as a backdrop for the story and the actions of the characters.
It could perhaps be said that Marguerite was well-drawn than some of the other heroines, or Gisela in particular, for whom the praise as being strong and courageous did not always seem deserved. Marguerite seemed more able to think, plan, and act independently, and get out of difficult situations- or at least attempt to do so. Colin was as usual fantastically good looking, strong and virtuous- but there was a certain neediness about him (at least initially) which could be endearing and make him seem more realistic and less perfect.

His relationship and attraction to Marguerite seemed more genuine and less fluffy than before- although the fluffiness did remain, expressed with a certain preoccupation with kissing and physical beauty towards the end. One can understand how the circumstances could draw the characters together – they didn’t need to keep on dwelling on how beautiful one another were- and seriously, there has to be more of basis for a successful marriage than just that.

My historical gripes were few, and perhaps a little pedantic. Colin saying he was not trained for war when all noblemen’s sons would have been- the style of armour the characters wore seeming decidedly old-fashioned- by a century or more, and the idea that subjects of the King of England could go to a foreign country and commit criminal acts against the subjects of a ruler he was allied with without him even seeming to notice and assuming they could just get away with it.
That and Marguerite wanting to have the chance to get to know her potential suitors as if this was something out of the ordinary- when it was actually the normal expectation for courting couples of high social circles at the time.
Also, perhaps one of the drawbacks to the story being centred on the same fairly small geographical region and family is that the some elements of the stories can seem repetitive, with lots of wanderings through forests and being chased by baddies in them that seem to have dominated the last three books.

Overall The Princess Spy was a good story with a sound Christian message about hope, forgiveness, and doing the best in difficult circumstances, and an interesting spin on the Frog Prince fairy tale. There seemed to be less Americanisms in the language of the characters than in previous stories, and I think Mrs Dickerson’s writing style is developing. It would certainly appeal to Young Adults and grownups with only a few reservations. I look forward to Melanie Dickerson’s next book, and the first in a new series The Huntress of Thornbeck Forest due out in May.

Grateful thanks to Booklookbloggers for providing me with a free ebook for review purposes. I was not required to write a positive review and all opinions expressed are my own.


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Loved this retelling of The Frog Prince! Melanie Dickerson, as always, hits it out of the fairy-tale retelling park :) Particularly enjoyed the chance to revisit the world of my still-favorite-of-hers The Merchant's Daughter (may or may not have grinned like a besotted fool when I realized who we were talking to). See more here: https://readingismysuperpower.wordpress.com/2015/04/16/the-princess-spy/ ( )