Title: Fairy Tale Ninjas – The Glass Slipper Academy

Written by: Paula Harrison

 Illustrated by: Monica de Rivas

Published by: Harper Collins

To celebrate the release tomorrow, 30th March 2023, I am going to review a fantastic new adventure series form the pen of Paula Harrison. Fairytale Ninjas – the Glass Slipper Academy is a fast romp full of all our favourite fairy tale characters with a few mermaids and unicorns thrown in for good measure. Red Riding reluctantly joins her friends, Snow White and Goldie Locks in attending the local ballet academy. She is bored of dance lessons she would rather be fighting trolls and giants and flying on dragons with fairies. But she should be careful what she wishes for especially when throwing a penny into the broken old wishing well that hasn’t worked for years.

Red makes an incredible discovery – hidden behind a secret door in the ballet studio is a storeroom full of costumes, swords armour and a magic carpet. Her secret discovered, their dance instructor Madam Hart agrees to give them sword-fighting lessons, explaining they are very similar to dance moves. During one of the lessons Madam Hart is arrested for the disappearance of the young Prince Inigo. Join Red, Snow, Goldie and their adorable rescue dog, Tufty as they search for the real villain behind the abduction of Prince Inigo. The intrepid gang travel to Diamond Palace to look for clues with ninja outfits from the storeroom in their backpacks.

I enjoyed this early reader chapter book. It moved at a good pace and the characters were easy to like. It was well plotted with a satisfying story arc. Young children will be excited to find out more about familiar fairy tale characters in new unique circumstances. I feel it is suitable for Key Stage One and lower Key Stage Two readers. The black and white illustrations add more depth to the characters, giving a visual impression of the characters and their actions at a glance, which is perfect for this age range. This is great for emergent readers to read alone, or for the teacher to read to the class and show the pictures, or indeed parents to read at bedtime.

A work of pure genius.

You can buy copies of Fairy Tale Ninjas – The Glass Slipper Academy by Paula Harrison from your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org, an organisation with a mission to financially support local, independent bookshops.

I would like to thank Isabel Coonjah from Harper Collins for sending me a review copy of the book.