This Princess Kills Monsters is chock full of homage to fairy tale stories we're deeply familiar with, heavy on modern-adjacent banter and narrative, and a handful of lovely little queer touches.

The book focuses on Melilot, resident middle child and princess of a mountain kingdom. She's called by her stepmother—a Melilot proclaimed evil sorceress and queen—and told that she's to marry a new King from a distant land. That king was ordered to ask for her hand by his dead father, except he was previously engaged to another that he truly loved, and SHE isn't taking the marriage being called off lying down. 

It sounds like a lot, and it is—and you get all of this information in the first chapter.

This was a fun book that wasn't necessarily for me as a reader but I think many people will have a grand time with. The author has fun weaving references to all sorts of fairy tales in and out of the plot, which for me sometimes became a little much. It's definitely a plot heavy book over a character heavy book, with the author honestly doing more to add kooky lore to this wild universe than develop characters. The characters more than anything served as stand-ins (with a few delightful queer twists) for the ongoing plot. Every time I thought that things couldn't get more zany, they did—which was often for me a little bit jarring.

For me this wasn't necessarily helped by the plethora of added information. I think sometimes reading this book felt like more work than it needed to, not because the story wasn't fun but because there were too many odd things happening that you weren't entirely sure what you needed to retain for the sake of the plot. Weird creatures, 12 huntsmen who all look alike and who admittedly don't get enough character development that it's easy enough to remember which is which (including our main character who only barely is able to discern Jack, the former fiance of the king, and Sam, her love interest), existing within dream states where the narrator didn't entirely know what was real or not—all fun aspects to this book that put together definitely were a little too much for me.

I had a fun time with the primary romance between Melilot and Sam, and enjoyed the twist that came with Sam after what was implied in the original "story" iteration of the plot that came in the first chapter, and the dynamic with Melilot and her sisters was also fun and I wish we'd gotten a little more time and development with them, and with the King's sister, Angelique. There was a point where she told Melilot that she saw her as a sister, and so I knew time had passed at that point I wish we had gotten to see more of that development play out (particularly because the blurb for the book teased something potentially romantic with them—though I love Sam as the primary romantic interest I was definitely thinking there would be more conflict with this semi triangle situation).

The narration itself wasn't my thing either—but will be a ton of fun for those who love books like Gideon the Ninth, where the story measures together modern vernacular and quirky storytelling with a more classic setting that traditionally gets more "serious" narrative structure. For me it felt a little too close to traditional story book narrative, with some characters purposefully obtuse and reactions to oddities a bit blunt in a way that works for a shorter story that didn't work for me in a longer novel.

All in all, while this book wasn't necessarily MY thing I do think that there's an audience who will have a grand time on this adventure, laugh along with the absurdities and gags, and be thrilled to find queer stories normalized within fairy tale universes. 3.5 stars from me!

Thank you so much to Random House and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for my honest review!