A princess, a cobbler, a witch, and modern-day South Beach mash up in Flinn's latest fairy-tale retelling. Johnny works tirelessly in a luxury hotel's shoe-repair shop, dreaming of becoming a high-end shoe designer. He sees an opportunity to get his shoes on famous feet when a hard-partying European princess moves in. Victoriana notices Johnny, too, and thinks he is just the one to find her brother, Prince Philippe, who was turned into a frog as blackmail for Victoriana's hand in marriage. She gives Johnny a fistful of cash, a transporting cloak, and an earpiece that allows him to understand animals that used to be human, which are a lot more plentiful in Florida than he ever imagined. Instead of a well-known classic, several lesser-known tales combine here to give the book a nice blend of the familiar (the frog who needs a kiss to transform) and the novel (how will a puny kid best two giants?). Readers will keep turning pages to figure out just how many transmogrifications Johnny can resolve, and whose dreams will come true.

A frog prince, enchanted swans, spell-casting witches, a magical cloak--all are quite real, seventeen-year-old Johnny learns after agreeing to find a princess's brother in modern-day Miami. Flinn's interlacing of tales ("The Elves and the Shoemaker," "The Six Swans," "The Frog Prince," to name a few) makes for entertaining reading; fairy-tale fans will be gratified by the true-love-was-there-all-along ending.

A warmhearted, goofy and occasionally quite silly tale—tales, really— featuring 17-year-old Johnny, a poor but honest shoemaker in a luxury hotel on Miami's South Beach who dreams of designer glory and keeping the electricity on. Who should breeze into his hotel but Victoriana, princess of Aloria, complete with a French accent and a hint of magic. Her "bruzzer" is missing! He's been turned into a frog! Johnny must help! What follows is a neatly nested series of fairy-tale mashups. Flinn cleverly uses quotes from the originals as chapter headings, from "The Shoemaker and the Elves" and "The Princess and the Frog" to "The Wild Swans" (which now live in that luxury hotel), "The Firebird" and others. Johnny's best friend Meg has a little magic of her own, and readers will probably want to reach into the pages and smack Johnny silly as he steadfastly misses the signals she sends. The friends proceed through this appealing, magic- and mishap-laced adventure, and it all ends quite nicely, as told in Johnny's clueless but endearing voice. The original tales are explicated briefly at the end. (Fractured fairy tales. 10 & up)

As she did in Beastly and A Kiss in Time, Flinn mixes traditional fairy tales with a modern setting in a romance that is clever but not always compelling. When the beautiful princess of Aloria visits the fancy South Beach hotel where kind, 17-year-old Johnny toils in his family's shoe-repair shop, she transforms his monotonous life. The princess promises to marry him if he can find her brother, who a witch has transformed into a frog. Borrowing details from such stories as ""The Elves and the Shoemaker"" and ""The Frog Prince,"" among others, Flinn sets Johnny on an adventure involving talking animals (actually bewitched humans called ""used-to-bes""), greedy giants, and a cloak that can transport Johnny and his best friend Meg anywhere they wish. Johnny and Meg face various villains and tests, from a relentless witch and her goony son to a park ranger who threatens to sell the frog prince on eBay. But readers may tire of the endless cloak hopping; they will have long guessed the book's conclusion, including who Johnny really loves and what really happened to his long-lost father. Ages 12%E2%80%93up. (Feb.)

Gr 6-9 Flinn reimagines a fairy-tale world in her latest novel. Teenaged Johnny works as a cobbler in his mother's shoe repair shop in a posh hotel in South Beach. He spends his days with his friend Meg and designs his own line of shoes while dreaming of wealth to free his family from the confines of poverty. Unexpectedly, the striking Princess Victoriana of Aloria comes to the swanky Miami hotel for a royal visit. The super-hot partying princess pleads for Johnny's help in finding her missing brother, and offers of money and a royal marriage convince him to take her seriouslyeven when she explains that the prince has been turned into a frog. With the aid of a magical cloak and some headphones that allow him to hear animals speak, Johnny embarks on a journey wherein he encounters talking swans, a fox named Todd, and two angry giants. When he lands in hot water with an evil witch bent on destroying him, Meg comes to his rescue. The pair journey from South Beach to Key West, to Europe, and to Manhattan; and in the end, Johnny finds wealth, fame, and true love. Flinn cleverly plays on some lesser-known fairy tales to make this book a fun, romantic adventure with likable characters. Rapid action and amusing situations make it a quick read that will easily entice even reluctant readers. Tara Kehoe, Plainsboro Public Library, NJ