Book Review: Froggy Style by J.A. Kazimer

Froggy Style
Author: J.A. Kazimer
Publisher: Kensington
Source: From publisher for review
ISBN-10: 0758269137 
ISBN-13: 978-0758269133
Buy it here: Amazon | Book Depository
For more information visit J.A. Kazimer's website

Reviewed by: Beth


Jean-Michel is the Frog Prince. As a boy he was kissed by a young princess, and turned into a boy. If he doesn’t marry the same princess, his, ‘One,’ then he will turn back into a frog. His fairy godmother thinks she has found his One, in the form of Sleeping Beauty. Jean-Michel is afraid she is right, so marriage plans are made. Afterwards Jean finds himself waking up after a night of drinking with a strange tattoo and a vague idea something is very wrong.

Froggy Style is the second novel in the F***ed-Up Fairytale series. These aren’t the kind that you have to read back-to-back. In fact the two novels have very little to do with one another. These are quick humorous stories with odd kinds of mysteries. They take the fairy tales we know, turn them on its head. The series is crude, absurd (I mean them both in a good way) and surprisingly modern.

Jean-Michel wakes up from his drunken night, remembering nothing, only to discover that he may or may not have hired an assassin to take out his princess. The clues lead him around the city (Cin City) to discover what happened. If you are thinking this sounds like The Hangover, then you’re right. It has some similarities.

As a character, Jean-Michel is so arrogant that he can’t put the pieces of his mystery together. He is also kind of an idiot, but he is purposely written this way, or seems so, for comedy. When the reader meets Sleeping Beauty for the first time, we agree that he shouldn’t be excited over his future bride. Though as he follows his clues to discover who he might have hired to kill his future bride he meets a tattoo artist, who he assumes many things about. Jean also has a manservant who adds to the comedy.

I figured out what was behind the plot well before the central character. Despite that I still enjoyed it. The funny twists on familiar fairy tales, and even how the characters make little rhymes in their heads’ is truly enjoyable. Kazimer does a great job with this. The only thing about the novel that really didn’t impress me was how the story tied together at the end. It still left a couple unanswered questions that didn’t fully make sense.

As in so many fairy tales there is a romantic side of the story. Even the romance is more funny than romantic. Jean-Michel is telling the story, and at times he thinks like a teenager, which added to the story for me. It let me wondering if there will be a third, and if so what story will we get next?
My Rating: