Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

Don’t you just love it when everything turns out exactly as it should?  Although this outcome isn’t usually consistent with real life, it does leave a reader with a warm and fuzzy feeling.  Princess Academy, by Shannon Hale, is a Newbery Honor Book about a fourteen year old Mountain Girl, Miri, who is very uncertain about herself and her future.  She has no idea why her father will not let her work in the linder quarry like the other kids her age in Mount Eskel, Danland and she feels very useless.   When an official from the royal family arrives in their village to say that a princess academy will be built to educate all girls age 12 to 17 because the priests have predicted the queen will come from the village, everything changes.  Through brilliant character development, we watch Miri grow into a strong, intelligent girl who saves the others girls at Princess Academy more than once and who helps the village improve it’s linder trading practices after years of being cheated.   Miri is not the only character we get to see grow in this book; Hale also does a brilliant job of having the supporting characters also transform into their best possible selves. The plot has multiple climaxes that are very descriptive and keep the reader on the edge of their seat.  Yet, the setting is what I was most impressed with in this book.  Hale effectively brings to life a believable, yet imaginary country, Danland.  Within this country, she effectively creates a unique province, a class system with each class having defining characteristics, a special language of the mountain people, a system of government, and even natural resources unique to the area.  I would love to spend some time in this writer’s imagination…absolutely fascinating!  Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.  What I liked most about this book are the strong female characters.  Miri does not end up being the princess (sorry, spoiler).  Rather, she makes a life of her own as a teacher by using her knowledge and resourcefulness.  Also, I liked how throughout the book “doing the right thing” is positively reinforced for the characters, and thus the readers, in a subtle, yet profound way.
            I’m not really sure if I would use this book for the whole class.  I don’t know if it has universal appeal and, although it was well done, it doesn’t have that something special that really exhilarates me.  I think if the teacher isn’t excited about a book, it’s hard to get the kids into it.  That being said, if I were to use this book I have a couple of ideas for activities.  First, the class could track the growth of Miri or any of the other characters.  I think this is an important activity because it allows students to more fully appreciate what goes into writing, and hopefully, it will improve their own writing.  Second, the description of the action and the dialog in this book would make many of the scenes wonderful options for acting on the dram a.  Besides the obvious public speaking benefits of acting, I think inhabiting the roles of these strong female characters would be very empowering for middle schoolers who are struggling with self-consciousness issues.  The characters in this book use their own, somewhat magical, language called quarry talk.   I think it is important that students ponder and try to grasp the importance of language and how it functions in their own lives.  I would have students ponder these questions: Why did the people of Mount Eskel need to form their own language?  Why can’t Britta understand the language?  How are languages created?  Lastly, I would do a lot with setting in this book.  Students could make maps and/or dioramas of Danland.  I think these are good assignments because they provide a form of assessment that students who may not succeed at paper/pencil tests can possibly excel at.  I think students would also have fun creating their own countries in a similar fashion to how Hale created Danland.   For their own country, they would need to come up with the geography of the land, language, government, social classes, prejudices, commerce, and natural resources.   When student’s engage in activities like this one, I think it helps them appreciate civilization and culture a lot more because it brings out the complexities of these taken-for-granted topics. I think it also helps them pay more attention to things such as government when learning about other cultures or historical events.
Year Published: 2005          Awards: Newbery Medal of Honor