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Paul Park is the close friend of a close friend, and I had heard such high praise for "A Princess of Roumania," and the subsequent books, that I dutifully read this series. But the story just doesn't carry through four books. By the middle of the third, "The White Tyger," I had found the series tedious and was ready to abandon it entirely -- but I persevered. "The Hidden World" delivers a satisfying conclusion and succinctly wraps up the hanging plotlines. If you're a devoted reader who feels ob...
(review is for the whole series)This series is about teen-aged Miranda and her two friends, Peter and Andromeda, who are pulled into the world of Roumania, an alternate Europe with a very different history where Roumania is a world power, a kind of magic exists, and the world is still at a WWI level of technology. In this world, Miranda is the child of important political figures and somewhat of a prophesied chosen one. This makes her sought after by a variety of people for purposes both good an...
A real let down, given the preceding volumes in the series.
After reading the first three (which really weren't that great), I couldn't even make myself finish this one.
This conclusion to Park's Roumania series, I think, finally brought me to terms with the previous books in the series. The other three books are decidedly odd, and I could never decide if I really liked them or not - odd again, for me, because I'm usually very clear-cut in what I do and don't like. In the conclusion, Park finally allowed me to figure out what exactly was going on in these books, and I enjoyed the layers of reality that he explores. I now want to go back and re-read the other thr...
Okay, either I'm getting used to this style just in time for the series to end or it really did take him four books to find his groove because this is the first book to grab me and give me some inkling of what the series' potential could have been.Of course it could be that the cover art looks like someone's tribute to what they were told a Walton Ford painting looked like, which I'm kind of okay with. It’s the little things, sometimes.I've said numerous times throughout the series that it never...
It seemed to take me forever to finish this book/series, but I'm glad I did. I loved the baroness's character, and I loved Andromeda's character. I really do wish there had been more of them in the series. I think the world that this author created was unique and enjoyable. I do wish that Miranda and Peter hadn't been so incredibly boring. Also, the pacing seemed off to me. Though I enjoyed this book, I can't think of anyone I would recommend it to. I just don't think most people (or at least th...
It is my own fault that I saw a woman sleeping beside a white tiger, and then glanced at the back cover to discover that "the lost princess of Roumania" was also "the mythical whyte tiger". Then add in ghosts of her enemies, demons released by her mother, and the insane spirit of the baroness that possesses her from time to time. And a hidden world where death is only an inconvenience. How could I *not* love this book? (These are not spoilers. They're on the back cover, after all)Well, the answe...
This is the fourth and final book in Park's Roumanian series, easily the oddest series I've read to date. (Could be the oddest story as well but then I recalled Santa Steps Out by Robert Devereaux and for sheer oddness, that one's tough to beat.) There are three main characters in the Roumanian series: Miranda, Andromeda, and Peter. And their trajectory through these books is hard to summarize. Let's just say that the tale involves: an alternate world; conjurers; magical items (including a gun h...
I'm glad it's over. There's nothing worse than being embroiled in a multi-volume alternate universe saga while it's still coming out. I loved these books, but the jury's out on whether they merit a rereading. They push some of the same magic realist buttons that Mark Helprin does, only Park is out of the closet about being a fantasy novelist. Crap covers, though.
Right, then, the final volume in Park's quartet about Greater Roumania. Park has been compared to a lot of other writers over the course of these four books, but one other springs to mind: Michael Swanwick, specifically his anti-pastoral fairy tale, The Iron Dragon's Daughter. These stories share a common approach to fantasy in which they refuse to deliver or indulge in the traditional consolations of the fantasy genre. So when Miranda turns out to be a Princess in a magical world where she wiel...
I'll come back and write more about this later but for now I will say that this is a very satisfying ending to the series - an ending that makes the work of reading the books totally worth it.
The final and (by far) weakest of the Paul Park "Princess" series.
Paul Park is a difficult author to read, but is someone that every aspiring author should read. His characters always be themselves, regardless of what you think, or may stereotypically expect. That's a difficult task, of not letting your characters become more likeable. People do not always change as magically as some authors allow their characters to. I will read this series again someday. Great Roumania is an interesting place.
