My Fair Fairy: The Very Fairy Princess by Julie Andrews

HI! I'M GERALDINE.

I'M A FAIRY PRINCESS.

I KNOW YOU MAY NOT BELIEVE ME, BUT I CAN TELL YOU I AM.

I KNOW THAT I'M A FAIRY PRINCESS BECAUSE I FEEL IT INSIDE.

There are lots of little girls who love fairies. There are lots of little girls who love princess stories and like to pretend they are the ones wearing the crown.

But Geraldine IS a fairy and she IS a princess. Her parents and siblings are just ordinary, plain-Jane folks, but Geraldine just knows she's been blessed with the fairy dust. She never goes out without her crown ("fairy princesses are always presentable"), and her big decision each morning is whether to wear princess pink or royal purple. She can turn ordinary flapjacks into fairy pancakes with fairy dust on top with a wave of her wand (otherwise known as a butter knife). Her doubting best friend Delilah is counseled with good advice: "You can be anything you want to be. You just have to let your sparkle out."

There are problems, of course, even for princesses with powers.

FLYING IS NOT ALLOWED IN CLASS, SO AT SCHOOL I HANG MY WINGS UP IN MY CUBBY.

MISS PYM SAYS FAIRY PRINCESSES DON'T FIDGET OR INTERRUPT.

BUT HOW ELSE CAN I BE ON THE LOOKOUT FOR PROBLEMS TO SOLVE? SOMETIMES YOU JUST HAVE TO SPEAK UP.--LIKE WHEN OUR CLASS PET, HOUDINI THE HAMSTER, ESCAPES!

It's a hard-knock royal life with skinned knees and lots of bumps along the road, one that makes a girl weary well before bedtime, and as she tells us, "Fairy princesses need lots of beauty sleep to RECHARGE their sparkle!" but our girl is up to the job. Geraldine is a girl with plenty of self esteem, in musical star Julie Andrew's latest picture book tale, The Very Fairy Princess (Little, Brown, 2010), co-authored by daughter Emma Hamilton, with a bit of fairy dust to sparkle up the illustrations of Christine Davenier. Fans of Fancy Nancy and her sister pinkanistas, not to mention all those readers of the fairy princess persuasion, will all go for Geraldine and her undeniable sparkle.