Princess For Hire

When a strange woman asks if you want to become a Princess, you say yes!

This books was good, good fun, the perfect book for a middle-grade reader, and still entertaining for anyone interested in some fluffy YA.
A bit hard to get into at first this book will draw you in once she starts her Princess-ships, but the pacing was my biggest problem, sometimes to slow, and dragging, and then speeding by, so you feel you missed out on something.
Meredith will initially completely irk you, she appears very one dimensional to begin with, and I’m still not comfortable with she and Desi’s first interaction, but she will become one of your very favorite characters.
This book is completely unreal! The rules are a bit here and there, who knows how this agency really functions between bubble-homes, time manipulation, reality TV affecting Magic Potential (okay, so I’m sort of with them on this one) and rainbow hair, but Desi makes up for all the fantasy by infusing this feel-good faerie tale with the longings, insecurities and naïve charm of a fourteen year old.
Desi is just like you were when you were fourteen, hey, she may be you now, she is so universal in her desire to stand out, make a difference and change the world! The cool thing is, she gets to, with royalty no less! Desi straddles her two worlds wonderfully and Leavitt did a great job providing useful parallels between Desi’s princesses, their problems and her own Idaho-based issues. Desi’s quirks are wholly unique, being a T-shirt designer and a lover of old movies as well as working as a rodent in her local malls pet store. Yep, you read that correctly, she has a job as a rodent, you’re hooked now, right?
I am really excited for the sequel, the love triangles that are brewing, the trials of being a Level Two Surrogate and the excitement of possibly becoming a permanent match for the Princess Elsa will all be revealed in April of 2011!
I would highly recommend this book for middle school age, it’s a fun read and will really hit home for girls who have these same fears, doubts and nagging problems in their lives, and who knows, maybe you have a little MP yourself and there will be an extra surprise within the folds of the pages!
Thoughts on the cover: I thought it was a little boring at first, but when it was in front of me I could really appreciate how all the items came together to form her personality.
Names: When Lilith makes that off-handed joke about her name meaning having something to do with darkness, I just cackled, I mean, you’ll be able to see the wicked smile and the lightning momentarily flash.