Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

A pair of titles join Gail Carson Levine's Princess Tales series, illus. by Mark Elliott: The Fairy's Return, a spoof on """"The Golden Goose""""; and For Biddle's Sake, based on a little-known German tale, """"Puddocky,"""" about a girl who must put her own magic to work in order to fight off her guardian fairy's penchant for turning people into toads. (Oct.)

School Library Journal

Gr 3-6-Light and breezy additions to the series. In For Biddle's Sake, young Parsley is turned into a toad by Bombina the fairy, and must convince Prince Tansy, the long-suffering younger brother of mean twins, to propose marriage to her in order to break the spell. In The Fairy's Return, a princess and a baker's son are infatuated with one another; Lark loves that Robin dares to joke with her, and Robin loves that she enjoys his jokes. Both fathers are against the friendship, and so years pass, until they are 15 and can finally wed after a fairy helps Robin perform three impossible tasks. Elements of various fairy tales, including "The Golden Goose," "Rapunzel," and "Puddocky," make their way into these funny stories. Eccentric and misguided characters abound; Robin's father, who fancies himself a genius poet, comes up with non-rhyming gems like, "Royalty and commoners must never mix./Remember this, or you will be in a predicament." Kids will love figuring what word he should have used in each poem, they'll cheer for the plucky heroines, and they'll relish the fairy-tale endings.-Eva Mitnick, Los Angeles Public Library Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

ALA Booklist (Thu Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2002)

Reviewed with Gail Carson Levine's The Fairy's Return .Gr. 3-5. Once upon a time, when a young girl asked a librarian for a princess book, she meant a traditional fairy tale featuring a princess. Now, as likely as not, she wants a book from Levine's series the Princess Tales, small volumes that borrow elements from folk-tales to create lively, new stories. In Fairy's Return , a princess falls in love with the third son of a baker, a young man whose jokes make her laugh. With both parents resisting the marriage, it takes determination, imagination, and the intervention of a wish-granting fairy to bring this couple to the point of happily ever after. For Biddle's Sake introduces Parsley, a sweet-natured girl raised by the fairy Bombina, who struggles with an obsessive drive to turn people into toads. After many years of relative control, she flies into a fit of rage and transforms her beloved Parsley. Only a marriage proposal from a human can return Parsley to her previous form. A few black-and-white drawings illustrate the stories, but the real draw of these attractively designed books is the inventive use of folkloric elements woven into charming, original stories.

Horn Book (Tue Apr 01 00:00:00 CST 2003)

In Return, a joke-telling baker's son uses a sticky goose and a train of fools to make the princess he loves laugh. Biddle reverses and expands on the story of "The Frog Prince." Both books in this series employ flat characterizations and over-broad, often unfunny farce, but the amiable plots and ubiquitous comic fairies make a pleasant diversion. Black-and-white sketches illustrate the books. [Review covers these Princess Tales titles: The Fairy's Return and For Biddle's Sake.]

Kirkus Reviews

<p>Levine continues her winning series of Princess Tales (The Princess Test and The Fairy Mistake, both 1999), creating two new stories from well-known classics. In For Biddle's Sake, elements of Rapunzel, the Frog Prince, and various quest tales recombine. Parsley, so named because that's all she wants to eat, forces her dad to steal it from the very disagreeable fairy Bombina. When she catches hima"just after she gets out of jail for the crime of not getting along with humansa"she takes Parsley to live with her. Parsley grows up so charming she even warms Bombina's heart; it's that smile, even if her teeth are green. Bombina's specialty is turning people and things into toads, and one day, quite accidentally, she turns Parsley into one. Parsley, meanwhile, is smitten with Tansy, the young princeling of the kingdom of Biddle, whose hopes for ruling wisely and well are thwarted by the fact that his obnoxious twin brothers are older. The king sends the boys on a quest, Parsley assists Tansy while in her toad guise, Tansy falls in lovea"Parsley's smile is lovely even when she's a toada"and breaks the spell, and Bombina even manages not to toadify the twins. The Fairy's Return conflates the weeping princess and the sticky goose. Robin the baker's son falls in love with Princess Lark, but they cannot marry because he's a commoner. Robin makes wonderful jokes that his father and twin brothers never let him finish. They are poets and wordsmiths and consider Robin simpleminded. (The twins make up words. Their father spouts couplets, wherein the last word is always a synonym for the one that would rhyme. Readers will have a fine time with that one.) The fairy Ethelinda has been flying for years, afraid to bungle her human interaction, but manages to solve Robin and Lark's dilemma with judicious use of the sticky goose and her ability to consume vast quantities of food and drink. This is all done in deliriously funny and well-wrought prose, full of sly wit and clever asides. Getting all the references is not required for laughing aloud. (Fractured fairy tales. 7-12)</p>