This article originally appeared in Booklist.
PreS-Gr. 2. Penelope may be an ordinary girl, but she's convinced that she's a princess. After all, she has an adoring king and queen (her parents); thrones (a dining chair; a potty chair); a chariot (a stroller); and a crown. Overall, being a princess is delightful, despite the occasional disappointment or repercussion for being a bit too demanding. Both the text and the art are tongue-in-cheek, contrasting the tot's reality with her imaginative play (her banquet of sweets is really a burger, peas, and fries). The pictures are a sophisticated cartoonlike blend of swirling embellishments, heavy black outlines, and daubs of pastel colors, with Gran using a pale-pink background to suggest Penelope's fantasy world and white one (with a palette of gray) to denote Penelope's less glamorous reality. The art and subtle humor may draw more adults than kids, and the retro, curlicue cursive used for the text isn't easy to read, but princesses-in-the-making probably won't be able to resist the idea of creating a kingdom from the stuff of everyday life.
Shelle Rosenfeld
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