Why unfairy tale? Well, what would you call it when the heroine refuses to act like a proper princess, and the hero is (take your pick) a king who can never live happily ever after, a smelly bear, a boy who isn’t perfect, or a six-inch dragon?

The adventures of the misfits provide an excellent escape for fifth-grade Amanda and her friends, wrestling with their own unfairy-tale trials and tribulations: Clarence the Bug-Eyed Creep, family crises, and Way Too Much Homework. Their lives intersect mysteriously with the lives of the fairy tale characters, leaving the girls to wonder whether there isn’t some magic at work after all.