Half Upon A Time by James Riley [review]

Title: Half Upon A Time (#1)

Author: James Riley

385 pages

First published: 2010

Genre: Fantasy, Children Literature

Language: English

My rating: 4/5

Jack: Do you have to be a prince to wake a sleeping princess?

Granfather: Who knows? Smooch her, see what happens.

The funny thing in Jack's family is that every newborn son in the family would be named "Jack". Jack (the Thirteenth) lived in a land where fairy tales happened. He was a 14 years-old boy who had a bad mark in a test of 'saving-a-princess' at school. He couldn't stand royalties. He didn't believe that there is a living breathing princess in this land. And he hated his father, an infamous criminal who went missing years ago for stealing from giants by climbing magical beanstalks. That's whay he lived with his grandfather now. And his grandfather loved adventures, unlike Jack. But he was going on an adventure anyway.

It happened so suddenly when a young girl with blond and blue hair fell from a portal in the sky, right in front of Jack's outstreched arms. The girl was wearing a T-Shirt with the statement "Punk Princess" on the front. Of course Jack thought she was a princess from Punk.

May denied that she was a princess. She was a normal girl from the real world. When the huntsman came to her house and kidnap both her and her grandmother, she was panicked and managed to escape. She was transported through a portal and landed in front of Jack. Of course she was surprised to find out that the fairy tales are real and apparently...her regal and beautiful grandmother was Snow White! The Snow White!!!

May: No, because my grandmother isn't a character in a fairy tale.

Jack: Fairies don't have tails.

"If your grandmother is Snow White, then you really are a princess." -- Jack

After a funny problem where every boys in the village tried to marry May the Princess, Jack and May went on a daring adventure to rescue Snow White from the Wicked Queen. Easy, right? Of course not. They were kidnapped by the ugly and cruel witch who lived in a candy house, got eaten by a giant, met the Wolf King, the Red Hood, a fairy godmother....and a dragon!

May: You're saying witches actually ride around on brooms? Wow, how old-school.
Jack: It's tradition.

Along the way, they were accompaied by a real-living-breathing prince named Phillip, who was devastatingly handsome, and dressed in golden regalia. The three of them went through a very magical journey to the castle of the Wicked Witch.

"Because it doesn't matter if you're in a fairy tale or here in real life, doing the right thing still counts for something." -- Jack

I love this book. It is a funny twist of fairy tales. This is a kind of children book that can make you feel good after reading it. A nice companion before going to bed, heheheee.... When I was reading it, I felt like a child again, enjoying a magical story...such a nice feeling :)

I love the character Jack. He is what I think a great main character should be like. A very young yet wise boy (but not too wise. He still had the air of innocence around him). He was adorably naive, but he was brave and kind. His character portrays how a young knight shoud be, eventhough he was a child of a criminal and not a royal-born.

I loved May in the beginning of the story, She was unlike typical princess. But along the way she behaved like a spoiled child and did many things without thinking. And did you really have to take away her sarcasm? It's what made her character unique. But when the sarcasm was "stolen" I was like "Whaaaaat.... now she is a typical princess. damn!". Put that together with Phillip, the "typical prince" character, and you get a cliche :(

I hope May and Phillip characters would be different in the sequel, anyway.

Overall, this is such a good book to read when you are having a moody-kind-of-feeling-to-read-anything. Because if you're having a reading slump, a nice children book is a good way to get rid of it :)

See you in the next post ^_^