Her Royal Highness

March 15, 2019
A Texas teen enrolls in a Scottish boarding school in this fresh spin on the commoner/royal romance.Keen geologist Amelia "Millie" Quint is spending her senior year in the Scottish Highlands, at the prestigious Gregorstoun school. It's a dream come true (hello, local rock samples) until Millie's roommate arrives. The gorgeous and glamorous Princess Flora of Scotland is rude and condescending, and the two girls can barely co-exist. Flora repeatedly tries to get kicked out of school, and Millie often finds herself dragged along for the ride. During the annual wilderness challenge, Flora sends their camping gear downriver in another scheme to get sent home. During the resulting trudge through the woods, the girls each admit to an attraction to girls (Millie is bi and Flora is gay), and they reach a turning point, starting to fall for each other. Can Millie hack it as a princess's girlfriend? What will Flora's mother, Queen Clara, say? Millie narrates in the present tense with funny, smart, and sarcastic observations of the posh people around her. The short chapters are interspersed with chatty gossip articles about events as they unfold, and character relationships come across clearly in dialogue that is at turns witty, awkward, and romantic. Millie's new friend Lady Sakshi is biracial Indian/white, while everyone else is white.Light and sweet. (Romance. 13-17)

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July 12, 2019

Gr 9 Up-Seventeen-year-old Millie has dreamed of spending her senior year in Scotland at the renowned boarding school Gregourstoun. For the first time, girls will be allowed to attend the school, and Millie is hoping for a scholarship. Leaving her hometown of Houston is that much more attractive after she has a falling-out with her close friend Jude. Determined to make the most of her academic experience, Millie plans to spend her year studying and exploring the geology of Scotland. However, her roommate turns out to be the Princess of Scotland, Flora Baird. Suddenly, Millie's social life takes a dramatic turn as she becomes an unwilling participant in Flora's attempts to get herself expelled from the boarding school and sent back to Edinburgh. Despite Flora's poor treatment of Millie, the two form a friendship that eventually develops into a romance. Their relationship not only faces the typical challenges of insecurity and miscommunication, but direct meddling from the Queen of Scotland as she attempts to control Flora's public image. Unlike in the first book, Royals, the characters here are not fully developed. Readers will need to rely on Flora's backstory from the prior companion novel to fully appreciate the story. The pacing is a bit slow at the beginning but picks up as Flora and Millie's relationship progresses. VERDICT This will likely not be chosen by readers as a stand-alone novel. Purchase where the companion novel was popular.-Lynn Rashid, Marriotts Ridge High School, Marriottsville, MD

Copyright 2019 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2019
Grades 9-12 Millie Quint is a self-described nerd with a massive lifelong crush on her best friend, Jude. After the girls spend a summer fooling around, Jude goes back to her boyfriend, leaving Millie heartbroken. The only answer, of course, is to leave for boarding school in the Scottish Highlands, escaping Texas?and Jude?for a year. Gregorstoun, the school where Millie has a full ride, also educates ladies and lords of royal breeding, including the crown prince and princess of Scotland?the very princess who is now Millie's roommate. Though they get off on the wrong foot, Millie quickly finds herself head over heels for Princess Flora and is delighted to find that Flora feels the same. Dating royalty isn't easy, though, and Millie might regret her situation by semester's end. Short interstitials from fictional gossip magazines add some background to characters and events as the novel progresses. The pace is slow to start, but with this modern fairy tale, Hawkins takes a fun new deviation from her Hex Hall and Rebel Belle series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)