Don't be fooled by the title - this is not a "princess book." Though the Princess Academy takes place in a fantasy land - a "once upon a time" sort of place - it reads like realistic fiction. 14 year old Miri, named for a mountain flower, finds herself studying with and competing against the girls she has grown up with in a remote mountain town. Only one can become the Princess of the land. What Miri learns goes beyond her Academy lessons. A wonderful tale that won a Newberry Honor.

Miri lives on a mountain where, for generations, her ancestors have quarried stone and lived a simple life. Then word comes that the king's priests have divined her small village the home of the future princess. In a year's time, the prince himself will come and choose his bride from among the girls of the village. The king's ministers set up an academy on the mountain, and every teenage girl must attend and learn how to become a princess.

Miri soon finds herself confronted with a harsh academy mistress, bitter competition among the girls, and her own conflicting desires to be chosen and win the heart of her childhood best friend. But when bandits seek out the academy to kidnap the future princess, Miri must rally the girls together and use a power unique to the mountain dwellers to save herself and her classmates.

A Newbery Honor Book
A New York Times Bestseller
A Publishers Weekly Bestseller
A Book Sense Bestseller
An ALA Notable Children’s Book
A NECBA Top 10 Fall Book
A Book Sense Children’s Pick "The most compelling, believable, poignant love story I have read in many a year. Shannon Hale is already, after only a few books, one of our best writers of fantasy. She is also one of those rare storytellers who can bring a jaded old reviewer like me to well-earned tears." —Orson Scott Card, New York Times bestselling author
 
"Shannon Hale writes deft, lyrical, wonderful fantasy." —Holly Black, author of The Spiderwick Chronicles and Tithe
 
"When it comes to contemporary classics, Shannon Hale has the makings of someone whose books will be read and reread for decades to come." —The 2006 Newbery Committee
 
"Princess Academy is the strong, well-written story of one girl’s determination to show that even a small mountain flower can be as valuable as a gold crown."
—Teenreads.com
 
"[A] magical read!" —Discovery Girls
 
"An unalloyed joy." —Kirkus Reviews, starred review
 
" “This is not a fluffy, predictable fairy tale . . . Instead, Hale weaves an intricate, multilayered story about families, relationships, education, and the place we call home."
—School Library Journal, starred review

SHANNON HALE started writing books at age ten and has never stopped, earning an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Montana sixteen years later, and publishing The Goose Girl, her first book, not long after that. She makes her home near Salt Lake City, Utah, with her husband, and their son, Max.

Imprint: Bloomsbury USA Children's Books
Distributor: MPS
Publication Date: 04-17-2007
Pages: 336
Measurements: 7.75in X 5.06in