Flunked

January 26, 2015
Calonita (the Belles series) blithely samples from fairy tales, nursery rhymes, and folklore in this lighthearted first book in the Fairy Tale Reform School series. Gilly is the 12-year-old daughter of a poor cobbler who lives in a boot, and she has a habit of stealing to support her family. But Gilly’s petty thefts result in her being shipped off to the Fairy Tale Reform School, founded by Cinderella’s formerly wicked stepmother in an effort to eradicate evil from the kingdom of Enchantasia and “turn wicked delinquents and former villains into future heroes.” The stakes are already high for Gilly—while she’s trapped at the FTRS, she’s anxious about how her family will make ends meet—before she becomes embroiled in a plot within the school, which may affect several of the reformed fairy-tale instructors. Recognizable fairy-tale characters abound (profiles of the school’s instructors, like Xavier Wolfington, the wolf from Little Red Riding Hood, appear throughout), and questions of whether goodness or badness run to the core of a person leave readers with plenty to consider. Ages 10–12.