In your classic fairytale, you’ve got a young woman facing horrible prospects or peril—think Snow White’s poison apple, Rapunzel’s imprisonment, Cinderella’s horrid home life, and Sleeping Beauty’s curse-triggered enchantment—only to be rescued by a prince. And not just any prince. Prince Charming. Such a feat of daring, you’d think, would immortalize the hero in song, but the four guys at the center of this book find that their individual identities have been sort of scrubbed away by bards more interested in the feminine side of the story. Thus nobody knows that Prince Duncan is an oddball who names every animal he sees and is thought of as a loser in dwarf circles, that Prince Frederic is a good dancer and appreciates fine footwear—but is afraid of anything more rousing than a picnic, that Prince Gustav tends to bite off more than he can chew when challenging monsters, even if he can survive a fall from a tower, and Prince Liam doesn’t want to honor his arranged marriage with a woman he woke from slumber with a kiss, mostly because she’s so incredibly vain and spiteful. The four men ultimately happen upon each other and band together—reluctantly, for some—in their individual journeys to navigate fairytale life and love, but they soon encounter someone else who’s upset by anonymity in legends: a witch who wants to do something so massive, no one will ever forget her name.
Christopher Healy’s story borrows from the best of the fairytale mashup genre without descending into biting Shrek-like parody. While the dwarfs—a plural they prefer to dwarves—are surly and the inter-kingdom politics are muddled, this isn’t a cynical or dark book. A strong thread of physical humor and running gags keep the story afloat, and the mismatched buddy comedy works, especially for readers who’ve always wondered why the guy who gets the girl is often such a blank slate.
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This article appears in Aug 8-15, 2013.
