Book Review: MY SORT OF FAIRY TALE ENDING by Anna Staniszewski

MY SORT OF FAIRY TALE ENDING by Anna Staniszewski, the last book in Jenny's adventure saga, releases on Tuesday, November 5th, and I'm super-excited about it! As you know, I fell in love with this series when I read the first book. I want to be an adventurer with Jenny and travel through magical lands, meeting real-life fairy tale characters! My youngest daughter (age 9) has been anxiously waiting for this final book in the series, re-reading books one and two over and over again for the past couple of months. (She was, of course, thrilled when I received an eARC from NetGalley to review!)

The official blurb (from Goodreads):
Jenny's search for her parents leads her to Fairyland, a rundown amusement park filled with creepily happy fairies and disgruntled leprechauns. Despite the fairies' kindness, she knows they are keeping her parents from her. If only they would stop being so happy all the time-it's starting to weird her out! With the help of a fairy-boy and some rebellious leprechauns, Jenny finds a way to rescue her parents, but at the expense of putting all magical worlds in danger. Now Jenny must decide how far she is willing to go to put her family back together.

My thoughts:
I love this final book every bit as much as I loved the first one! This series expertly turns the fairy tales you think you know (and even some you didn't) upside down and inside out. I love following along with Jenny as she confronts the "reality" of fairy tales, showing us that there's so much more behind the "happily ever after" cliches in the stories we all grew up with. (I especially loved the Cinderella twist in this latest installment!!)

This series definitely falls into the "read it over and over and over again" category of books. In fact, the only thing that I didn't like about it was the cover art. Not that the covers aren't cute and fun, but they make Jenny's saga appear to be a collection of "girl books," and every single one of the boys I've recommended the books to has balked. Incidentally, 100% of the boys who have reluctantly picked up the story at my recommendation has absolutely loved the story. ("This isn't a girl book at all!") But they read it secretly, because they don't want to be seen reading a "girl book" in public. - This problem is easily solved by purchasing the ebook version (since no one sees the book cover when you're reading on an ereader), but I kind of wish the publisher had chosen cover art to emphasize the adventurous nature of the story, so it wouldn't be so hard to convince the reluctant readers to take a chance! (Update: I just found out that Anna Staniszewski wrote a guest blog about this very topic! Read her thoughts on the issue here.)

If you haven't read MY VERY UNFAIRY TALE LIFE (book 1) or MY EPIC FAIRY TALE FAIL (book 2), spend the weekend catching up, so you'll be ready to join Jenny on her final adventure! And if you've already read them several times over (as I have), and don't want to wait another minute for MY SORT OF FAIRY TALE ENDING, Anna Staniszewski has very kindly provided us with the first chapter to hold us over until Tuesday. You can even get a copy of the super-fun prequel, JENNY'S FIRST ADVENTURE, for free!!