2.5 stars

“Compared to those distant powers, the problems of the human heart seemed unimportant.”

Malva is a fifteen-year-old Princess of Galnicia with a dream to escape her fate and duty in pursuit of free will and adventure. Philomena, Malva’s chambermaid and best friend, agrees to stow away with Malva and sneak out of Galnicia. Malta and Philomena promise to live the rest of their lives together, but the future does not go as planned.

Orpheus has always been drawn to the sea but believes he has a medical condition that prevents him from being able to survive on the open water. When rumors of Malva being alive and imprisoned circle the city, Orpheus is determined to answer the call of the ocean and his nation—he resolves to rescue the princess at all costs.

“Everyone on board the Fabula knew it wouldn’t be easy to explain their passage beyond the boundaries of the Known World."

The Princetta has the potential to sail you to a different world on the trail of adventure but falls flat in the delivery. Malta and her crew find themselves in interesting and unique situations, which is the only reason I kept reading. The main reason I wanted to stop reading this book is the pace. The pace is too slow, and the book would benefit from some edits to remove unnecessary information that weakens the plot of the story; for example, a lengthy return to Galnicia and restoring the nation. The story starts when Malta leaves Galnicia and should end when she returns. Instead, the ending reveals a variation of HEA—not romantically— that is dissatisfying and does not leave the reader daydreaming like you would expect an adventure novel should. Additionally, the character Lei is a built-in “get out of jail free card,” and stunts the suspense and growth of the plot. The novel was just okay. I did not want to keep picking it up, but I did because I wanted it to be over. It is possible the French version did the story justice and did not translate well to English. ( )

Malva, la heredera al trono de Galnicia, tiene su destino sellado: deberá casarse en breve con un príncipe. O eso creen sus padres. Porque esa misma noche decide huir lejos, más allá de los confines de la tierra conocida, hacia un mundo inexplorado salpicado de islas paradisíacas junto a otras habitadas por seres procedentes de la peor de las pesadillas. Atrapados en el Encierro del Archipiélago, Malva, el capitán y el resto de la tripulación deberán enfrentarse a toda clase de obstáculos para salir de él antes de que se agoten las piedras de vida que poseen.

A pretty fair fantasy adventure romance kind of thing, with a few memorable bits and pieces, although it was disappointing that Malva's fiery anti-establishment instincts fizzled out so completely - for her, the personal did not, after all, become political. The invented words were very appealing, though, even if there were moments when the writing (as translated from the original French) didn't always quite work for me. ( )

Malva, la heredera al trono de Galnicia, tiene su destino sellado: deberá casarse en breve con un príncipe. O eso creen sus padres. Porque esa misma noche decide huir lejos, más allá de los confines de la tierra conocida, hacia un mundo inexplorado salpicado de islas paradisíacas junto a otras habitadas por seres procedentes de la peor de las pesadillas.

Originally published in French as La Princetta et le Capitaine, Anne-Laure Bondoux’s 2004 novel is a children’s epic of adult proportions. Published in the U.S. by Bloomsbury Children’s Books, it has retained the basic aspects of a children’s novel – the high adventure, made up creatures and far-off places—but has also retained a mature perspective on the concept of the hero and of the epic journey.

Bondoux has managed to make adult emotions and situations playful by creating a whole new world out of the mixed origins of our real world. She’s taken known cultures – American, German, Italian, Spanish, Indian, Japanese and French (for example) and mixed them together, mixed their languages together, to make this new world with its new vocabulary.

Some terms and items retain their meanings (i.e. a harem is still a harem and a sword is still a sword) but others are composites of various languages. For instance, the robes worn inside the harem are called “sarimonos,” an obvious combination of the Indian sari and the Japanese kimono. (Yes, I feel like the dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding.) . And then there are the slave-guardians of Gai’s harem, the preunuchs, a term which sounds like a mix of “prefect” (at least, by Harry Potter standards of the definition of prefect) and “eunuch.”

Bondoux not only combined languages, but created a tour de force of both cultural and literary pastiche. The structure of the story is basically reminiscent of French and German fairy tales but as the journey continues the palate broadens, dipping into shades of Greek tragedy, biblical parables and even venturing towards LeGuin’s Earthsea in the chapters on the archipelago. Even some of the character names draw on literature and myths—specifically Orpheus (related to the myth of Orpheus and Euridice), Zeph (best associated with Zephyrus who brought Psyche to Cupid’s palace) and—though perhaps the most obscure—Babilas (who is quite large and quite strong, whereas St. Babilas was the patron saint of those with rheumatism and arthritis.)

I imagine the novel was quite a task for translator Anthea Bell to take on. Taking words of mixed origins settled among the regular French text must have been slightly troublesome. However, she managed wonderfully. As beautiful as I’m sure the novel reads in its original French, Ms. Bell has managed to take Bondoux’s work and make English feel like the original. That being said, the real beauty lies in the imaginative world that Bondoux has created—a world where women are sometimes islands, fathers are not always kind, and dreams aren’t always what we’ve wished for.

A side note: this is one of those books that I came across kind of accidentally, and fell in love with. I'm sad that I have to give it back to the library, and I hope to someday own my own hardcover copy...when I can afford it!

Lauren Cartelli
www.theliterarygothamite.com ( )