The Princess and Her King

The Princess and Her King: A Special Mission – A Personalized Children’s Book, written and illustrated by Jessica Angel, illustrates the special relationship God has for each of us, even before we are born. This is shown by the story of a young girl, who lives in Heaven, and is “chosen” by God to be born into a family with a loving mother and a loving father that God also “chooses” for her.

The book is set up to be personalized for the reader. The instructions say to fill in the blanks with your child’s name and personal information. The text begins: “In another time and a faraway place, there lives a beautiful young princess named _____________. ___________ is so beautiful that even the animals love to be around her. She has ___________ (long/short) _________ (color of hair), ___________ (straight/curly) hair and __________ (color of eyes) eyes. She has smooth skin and her eyelashes are so dark and curly that her eyes smile whenever she smiles.” After that first paragraph, all the remaining blanks are simply filled in with the child’s name.

The illustrations, also by the author, are on most of the left-hand sides of two-page spreads throughout the book. But, the background for all the pages is a light purple, and each illustration and textbox is outlined to give the appearance of a scrapbook.

What I Like: The author is on a mission, that of teaching children about God and how to apply the gospel in their lives, particularly in regards to girls. Her mission statement is: “Raising up girls to be beautiful in Christ, faithful to Christ, compassionate because of Christ, pure hearted, servants like Christ, submissive to his will, changed by his love, focused on their purpose, real, connected, prepared for this world, but not of it!” I like that, and she does a good job of projecting that love and dedication throughout this book.

What I Dislike: However, although I like the colored background for the pages and the outlining of the illustrations and text, I don’t really like the overall layout of the book. The pages are set up so that there is an illustration on almost every left-hand side of every two-page spread with the text on the right-hand side. This makes the layout somewhat boring. Also, there is very little text to go along with some of the illustrations, leaving lots of empty space on those pages. I realize that’s not a big issue, but I felt it should be mentioned.

Overall Rating: Good.

Age Appeal: No age group is given, but I would say 6-12 would be appropriate.

Publisher Info: OutskirtsPress.com, 2011; ISBN: 9781432768768; Paperback, $17.95.

Buy now at Amazon $17.95!
Special Info: As part of her ministry, Jessica is sending a portion of her book proceeds to support missionaries around the world.

This book is written mainly for girls.