Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower

3½ stars for cleverness despite the redundancy.

I really liked this little novella for its take on traitional fairy tales and its reversal of expectations/roles. The princess saves herself instead of waiting around helplessly, which is a nice change of pace. I was a bit on the fence about the random scenes of violence and gore, but I see how they were used to shape (and harden) Floralinda. Cobweb was a cute yet fiesty companion throughout and, even though I'm not too sure about the 'romance' between the two, they did make a formidable pair when faced with all manners of creatures, mythological and otherwise.

I feel that the narrative was repetive in places, and the use of the same ‘trick' to slay the beasts over and over again lacked excitement. The fights could have been more interesting if Floralinda had used different ways for defeating the creatures, but the parade of beasts on each floor was fun to read about, nevertheless. I'm also not so sure about the conclusion; I expected Floralinda to go on her way as a changed woman, not remain in the tower that had kept her prisonner for so long. In a way, it's as though she can never leave her captivity even though she changed tremendously.

Overall, this was a fun, subversive read!