Reviews
***** 5 stars"This was a wonderful book, beautifully written. It doesn't get such high marks on GR for nothing. It is absolutely wonderful, and you slip right into the world of this little girl - in her good times and her bad. It is an effortless transition for the reader, even though her world is completely different from what most of us have ever experienced. It does take a chapter or two to really get into the story, but once you do - watch out. I was listening to this on my MP3 player at night when I couldn't sleep, and from about the midpoint of the novel, the story actually kept me awake. It was completely worth it though!" -Laura
***** 5 stars "I've always admired Frances Hodgson Burnett's ability to build a tactile England, as well as populating it with human, complex characters, while giving them magical stories that simultaneously didn't insult the intelligence of her young readers and withstand the test of a century. A Little Princess is no exception. It is a realistic fiction touched with just enough fancy to give it the incredible feel of a well told fairy story. There is a heroine (or more than one), a villain, princes galore (after a fashion), and even a genie (if you look at him right)." -Emily
**** 4 Stars "Like Walt Disney, Burnett is deeply interested in transformation. The Secret Garden, another wonderful book, is a more linear transformation from a sour girl into a loving one by virture of the English countryside and its denizens. But A Little Princess has more going for it. A start in colonial India, the pain of losing the only surviving parent, and the challenge not to transform, but to stay true. But Sarah Crewe is more than a Penelope at her loom. She believes in magic--and really, the kind she brings to the story as its protagonist is the ability to make us believe that loss of faith is not the end of the story. There's a bit of a deus ex machina here, but it's no less winning for that. A lovely book to give as a gift to a young girl. The movie (1995) directed by Alfonso Cuaron, is visually lyric, beautifully adapted and memorably acted." Stephany
***** 5 stars ~"This book never fails to make me sad. Ever. I've read it a couple of times over since I was a kid, and every time it makes me feel like I want to hug Sara a million times over, and shake her (adorable) father for ever putting her under Ms. Minchin's care.
As for Sara, as with most of Frances Hodgson Burnett's characters, she's a wonderfully three-dimensional character, with enough personality to make me want to have been her, when I was younger. I couldn't stop quoting her, I really couldn't. She really was a quaint little princess all throughout everything that happened.
Delightful book. I completely recommend this if you want to have your children get into classics, or if you wanted to enjoy a good story yourself." -Johara
"This is a story about a different kind of princess than one might imagine; a princess that is an orphan - lonely, cold, hungry and abused. Sara Crewe begins life as the beloved, pampered daughter of a rich man. When he dies a pauper, she is thrown on the non-existent mercy of her small-minded, mercenary boarding school mistress. Stripped of all her belongings but for one set of clothes and a doll, Sara becomes a servant of the household. Hated by the schoolmistress for her independent spirit, Sara becomes a pariah in the household, with only a few secretly loyal friends. But through her inner integrity and strength of will, Sara Crewe maintains the deportment, inner nobility and generous spirit of a "real" princess.
Loved it!!!!" -Janice
***** 5 stars "I've always admired Frances Hodgson Burnett's ability to build a tactile England, as well as populating it with human, complex characters, while giving them magical stories that simultaneously didn't insult the intelligence of her young readers and withstand the test of a century. A Little Princess is no exception. It is a realistic fiction touched with just enough fancy to give it the incredible feel of a well told fairy story. There is a heroine (or more than one), a villain, princes galore (after a fashion), and even a genie (if you look at him right)." -Emily
**** 4 Stars "Like Walt Disney, Burnett is deeply interested in transformation. The Secret Garden, another wonderful book, is a more linear transformation from a sour girl into a loving one by virture of the English countryside and its denizens. But A Little Princess has more going for it. A start in colonial India, the pain of losing the only surviving parent, and the challenge not to transform, but to stay true. But Sarah Crewe is more than a Penelope at her loom. She believes in magic--and really, the kind she brings to the story as its protagonist is the ability to make us believe that loss of faith is not the end of the story. There's a bit of a deus ex machina here, but it's no less winning for that. A lovely book to give as a gift to a young girl. The movie (1995) directed by Alfonso Cuaron, is visually lyric, beautifully adapted and memorably acted." Stephany
***** 5 stars ~"This book never fails to make me sad. Ever. I've read it a couple of times over since I was a kid, and every time it makes me feel like I want to hug Sara a million times over, and shake her (adorable) father for ever putting her under Ms. Minchin's care.
As for Sara, as with most of Frances Hodgson Burnett's characters, she's a wonderfully three-dimensional character, with enough personality to make me want to have been her, when I was younger. I couldn't stop quoting her, I really couldn't. She really was a quaint little princess all throughout everything that happened.
Delightful book. I completely recommend this if you want to have your children get into classics, or if you wanted to enjoy a good story yourself." -Johara
"This is a story about a different kind of princess than one might imagine; a princess that is an orphan - lonely, cold, hungry and abused. Sara Crewe begins life as the beloved, pampered daughter of a rich man. When he dies a pauper, she is thrown on the non-existent mercy of her small-minded, mercenary boarding school mistress. Stripped of all her belongings but for one set of clothes and a doll, Sara becomes a servant of the household. Hated by the schoolmistress for her independent spirit, Sara becomes a pariah in the household, with only a few secretly loyal friends. But through her inner integrity and strength of will, Sara Crewe maintains the deportment, inner nobility and generous spirit of a "real" princess.
Loved it!!!!" -Janice