I was not sure what to expect from this book though I’d
read about the basic plot before publication.
I love the Clockwork Century books by Priest so why not?
Libby Deaton and May Harper become friends in fifth
grade when both of them have sit out Phy Ed for a time.
Together, beginning with a chalk drawing on the
playground at school, they create Princess X.
She is “a blue-haired girl in a puff-sleeved princess
dress, wearing a big gold crown and red sneakers” who wields a katana. She lives in a purple haunted house with
friendly ghosts and watches over the town of Silverdale.
Over the years, the girls fill notebooks with stories
of Princess X. May makes up the stories
and Libby draws them out.
One day Libby and her mom are killed when their car
goes off a bridge on a perfectly ordinary day.
She is left with nothing of their friendship, as Libby’s
father moves out of state suddenly and all of the stories disappear with him.
Except. It is possible that the stories and scrapbooks
went to a thrift store somewhere in the city.
Perhaps they can be found. May
makes her parents drive all over looking for them.
When May’s parents divorce, she is shuttled to Atlanta
to start a new life and make new friends.
On visits to her father, she still hops on a bus and searches for the
notebooks.
Or is Libby alive?
Secretly, May never believed Libby died, wouldn’t believe it. She dreamed over and over that Libby had
broken out of the car and rose to the surface, alive. Her parents hated this obsession, because
Libby’s body was found, downstream from the submerged car, severely eaten by
fish but with Libby’s clothing and school ID.
On May’s travels through the city she began to see more
Princess X stickers. It turned out there
was a website that had gone up about six months ago that was wildly popular, as
it featured the story of Princess X, new stories May didn’t know. Nobody knew who wrote the comics, the IP
could not be traced by even the most intrepid geek.
The Comics feature Princess X, held prisoner by Needle
Man, and The Ghost Queen “mother and avenging spirit” who helps the Princess
escape the Needle Man, and watches over her.
With the help of Patrick, a neighbor with a bit too
much tech saavy for his own good, May reads the comics, and is convinced Libby
is alive and reaching out to her with the comics.
Thanks to Patrick, she learns that the accident that
killed Libby’s mother and perhaps Libby was no accident. Libby’s mother was
shot in the head, leading her to drive off the bridge. May’s parents had managed to hide all of this
from her.
A clever intermingling of the search for Libby and the
story of Princess X’s daring escape from Needle Man becomes a really tense
thriller of a story. The Needle Man is
not only real, he is very tech savvy as well and he is relentless in his search
for Princess X. He is willing to murder,
lie, steal, do anything to get her back.
He is incredibly clever.
I read the book in a single evening, just
transfixed. When I closed the book, I
said, “wow, that was just spectacular, one of the best things I’ve read in
ages.”
