What a delightfully twisted descent – and I’m not talking of climbing down the tower.
Content warnings include: violence, injury, death, abduction and imprisonment, forced gendering, vomiting, ableist language, casual fatphobia, mentions of suicide.

The book immediately gets you with its abudance of “WTF?!” moments and others that make you snicker. It’s grotesque, particularly so in contrast to the wholesome fairy tale vibe it spins. But it’s much closer to the dark side of the original fairy tales than the Disney ones, that’s for sure!

The setting isn’t entirely fantastical. There’s quite a lot of modern references, which made me wonder about what sort of age the book is supposed to play it. I didn’t find that as jarring as it might have been, as those references were clearly more there for humorous material than anything else. It lightened and loosened up the atmosphere.

Because wow, the book had a smothering feeling. I mean, it is about an abducted girl slowly getting desperate as she is locked in a tower full of monsters, completely alone!

The cast is very limited, with Floralinda at the center. She makes for an unusual protagonist, not very proactive or quick on the uptake, not imaginative or, actually, very kind. Her flaws are furthermore emphasized by the narrator, who talks down on her quite frequently, but her character development is fascinating to read in its unusualness, and entirely appropriate for her situation.

One of the few side characters is also were my one big issue with the book comes up – the atmosphere and humor are very unique and will probably be hit or miss for most people, but what I really could have done without was the forced gendering. The character in question does not have a gender and is not interested in assuming one, but Floralinda thinks they should, and decides that they are a girl. The character is then addressed with she/her pronouns for the rest of the book.
There are still repeated reminders that they are not a girl, and in fact pronouns are often avoided for them, but that the protagonist thinks she can enforce a gender on another person who says they have no gender still felt very, very wrong. Especially considering the role the character ends up playing it left me with a bad feeling. This also wasn’t questioned, and neither was the book’s overall very binary look at the world.

Overall, Princess Floralinda is a shortwhile and slightly obscure novella, with a dark aftertaste that can get quite gruesome and doesn’t shy away from making things more difficult for the hapless protagonist, or driving her to extremes.

Not for the faint of heart, but the very straightforward plot and deceptively simple concept still manages to be twisted in all the right ways.

It feels like - everything I was looking for when I was a young queer girl reading The Hobbit and The Last Unicorn - I found here. This book has all of the whimsy and tongue-in-cheek qualities that you look for in one of these *feels like a fairy tale but remix it* books but this time with a healthy dose of Tamsyn Muir's trademark subversion of classic tropes, often making them women, funnier, and (often) queer. The ending of this book had me yelling loudly at midnight and most likely waking up everyone in my apartment complex, and I truly cannot recommend it highly enough.

If you like subversive fairy tales with violence, toxic/messy relationships, flawed main characters, and yelling "Omg" at the ending, I think you'll really like this!

There were moments I really disliked Floralinda and I understand that those reactions are entirely intentional. There were moments where I felt terribly sorry for a character, and then I'd go to the next page and Muir would write about how the reader is probably feeling terribly sorry for the character, so I knew that I was completely in the author's hands and was able to let myself be carried in the messy chaos. I love the writing skill and narrative and the dry humor and the nuance and messiness of relationships, people, and the choices we make and how we categorize them as "good" or "evil."

This is another small novella with a big impact that's going to sit with me for awhile.

Thank you to Netgalley for an Arc in exchange for an honest review.

This was a delightfully fun, magical, fairy tale that I really enjoyed! The narrative is charming and sweet, easy to read for young adults and adults, alike. This new author is a talented writer as evidenced by this neatly put together story with just the happiest of endings! Thanks Netgalley for a review copy of this new book.

Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower was absolutely perfect. A witch has locked damsel in distress, Princess Floralinda, at the top of a monster filled tower to be rescued by a worthy prince, but princes stop coming and she has to save herself. It's a delightful monster slaughtering spree and Muir is fantastic at making the gruesome fun. Princess Floralinda is perfect if like me, you're looking for something to hold you over until Alecto the Ninth.

What had happened was that the witch put Princess Floralinda in a tower forty flights high, but said it wasn’t personal. She told her to cheer up. “Princes will be flocking from near and far to rescue you,” she said. “I’ve covered all my bases. There’s a golden sword at the gates for a prize, if the prince doesn’t care overmuch for princesses, and once he battles his way up thirty-nine flights you’re free to go. I don’t really mind what happens from this point in.”

***

This is fun. A bit gory and frightening in the monster-killing details, but definitely the subversive princess-in-a-tower fairytale retelling that the blurb promises.

There is some gender essentialism in here, but it feels subversive? Maybe? The book’s narrator is clearly mocking Floralinda’s thought process re: gender and the binary views she learned from her family/society. I am not sure if it goes far enough to push against it, but the subversion is there. Honestly, I am not the best person to be critiquing this due to a lack of expertise/knowledge. The humor in this book is subtle and biting; so while I think the subversion mostly works, I can see readers disliking that it doesn’t go far enough in a more explicit confrontation. YMMV.

Disclaimer: I received a free e-ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! This book took me by surprise, in more ways than one. For one thing, I wasn't expecting just how dark it would be, and let me tell you, it was dark, lol. But also, it was very amusing, with clever and witty writing throughout the entire story. Not that I was expecting something dull, I mean, but the witticism and sarcasm were just non-stop and on point, always. The ending left me feeling... honestly, I don't even know yet. I'm still digesting. But it was definitely "whoa."

Huge thanks to Netgalley and Subterranean Press for providing me the ARC of this book!

As with Tamsyn Muir's other works, this was a wild ride in the best way possible.

In this upside-down fairytale, Floralinda proves herself by working her way down each floor of the Forty-Flight Tower, done with waiting on a prince to save her. With the help of a stubborn but studious fairy named Cobweb, Floralinda begins to realize that she is more than just a dull princess.

Muir has once again blended her clever storytelling and meme-worthy humor to provide an enjoyable, heartwarming reading experience.

WHAT THE F—-?!?!?

I—

This book is not what I expected and I still don’t know if I liked it, but that ending? I’m totally bamboozled.

This is a book I feel it’s best to reveal little about because it’s best to go in and be totally drawn in. Suffice to say Princess Floralinda takes traditional fairy tale princess-in-a-tower tropes and flips them in a way that didn’t go the way I expected. There was a part of the end I really enjoyed, the way the journey transformed Floralinda, but that final scene?!? I’m just here screaming wtf!

This was a really good read, and I enjoyed it immensely! The author has a way of writing that completely blocks out the outside world and makes the book utterly consume you! It was funny and exciting and I can’t wait to check out the rest of the author’s books!

my God.
First off, thank you NetGalley and Subterranean Press for this. I requested this book early yesterday morning at like 5am, not thinking I'd have any luck. The approving email came a few hours later and I nearly screamed when I woke up.

Taz Muir has done a fantastic, unsettling job, capturing the usual fairy-tale tone while keeping her own unique voice. Floralinda is the usual gorgeous princess forced into a tower, with the same few magicked foods-- and who now cannot relate to that?-- her usual waiting interrupted by the fairy Cobweb, a garden fairy with a knack for sciences. Together the two have to figure out how Floralinda can escape the tower (one willingly, the other less so) before winter comes and she freezes to death. Their relationship and the dynamics are the main linchpin of the book, and as usual, when Taz Muir delivers, she absolutely delivers.

This is a hell of a treat, and a delight to see pop up in my approvals from NetGalley (thanks again to Subterrranean for the approval!). It’s a transformation tale, but not the one you think it is, though you will start to have a glimpse of it early on in the story. There’s a great combination in reading this of hope and tension as Floralinda tries to get out of her tower, and gets even better when Cobweb shows up. Muir is great at amazing little jabs throughout the novella, and the fact that I blazed through it in two days speaks to how well she wrote it. Pick this up when it comes out, you won’t regret it.

Ok, so what if you knew you lived by fairy tale logic? And you leaned right into it, for the aesthetic. That’s our witch. A full-on cliché and loving it. She locks Princess Floralinda away in a tower “for the art of the thing.” The princes as well, flocking to the tower and it’s dragon with diamond encrusted scales and treacherous tasks, queueing for their turn at a heroic success or valiant death. After all, there is a princess to rescue, or at least a golden sword to be won if princesses aren’t your thing.

I loved this novella. I loved the way it pays tribute to classic fairy tale tropes and monsters, and then, as I came towards the end, to paraphrase the book itself. I began to feel absolutely ill; to feel as though I could be sick at any minute, but I didn’t know when. It was the unicorn that pushed me over the edge.

Princess Floralinda (Floralinda Amelia Melisande Augustina Eleanora Selina) is far more practical and determined than any proper fairy tale princess has a right to be, and grows more so as the flights descend and she finds that she chafes against the tropes her world is expected to live by. After all, being forced into isolation in a tower, left to guiltily watch as several dozen princes die below as they attempt a heroic rescue, with nothing to eat but bread oranges and milk isn’t exactly anyone’s idea of a good time.

Cobweb is a bottom-of-the-garden fairy, and an amateur chemist, who rather unluckily gets trapped in the tower as well. Cobweb firmly believes in the roles and rules for fairies... but also knows it would be nice to just be able to go and be a chemist instead of granting small and specific wishes to children in gardens. She’s mean and clever and far too good for the entire situation.

This tower is an adventure.

What a fun romp through a fairy tale turned on its head! I loved every second of this read, especially the snarky non-binary fairy and the thorough examination of the bewitched tower rooms and items. I loved that the fairy (Cobweb) and Floralinda essentially MacGyver the heck out of these witchy, magicked rooms and manage to make what they need to survive.

I was a bit annoyed by Floralinda's weakness at first, but that turns out to be an essential element of the story - a classic, dainty princess's transformation into her own savior, with the forced help of a very science-savvy fairy.

And the tower itself, what a creation! I love that I can read this book and feel a deep sense of appreciation for the behemoth torturing monster machine that this witch has created. Each floor holds a different mythical beast, and the really "difficult" ones have cost the witch quite a lot of money, because in fairy tale reality, nothing is free.

Gideon the Ninth is still on by to-be-read pile, and I now feel utterly compelled to get right on it!

In this novel, Tamsyn Muir has produced a work of snarky, whimsical delight. Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower bundles up a set of traditional fairy-tale tropes, lights them on fire, and cheerfully warms its hands over the blaze. When the embers burn down, you are left with something darkly comedic, cleverly imagined, and utterly unique.

Floralinda herself is a princess who has, as princess often are, been trapped at the top of a very tall tower by a very enterprising witch. Each level of the tower is filled horrible monster, and the entrance is guarded by a fearsome dragon. When a plethora of useless princes prove unsuited to the task of rescuing her (and become dragon chow in the process), Floralinda takes matters into her own hands. She is joined by a bottom-of-the garden fairy slash amateur chemist named Cobweb, and together the two of them cook up all kinds of nasty schemes.

I could talk for ages about how Muir is a modern genius of innovative story-telling, but I'll limit myself to marveling in how clever the narrative structure of this novella is. Each chapter details Floralinda's escapes on different levels of the tower, a top to bottom journey both in the physical and metaphorical sense, as Floralinda reinvents herself to become her own rescuer along the way. Truly a prime example of function following form, but also a brilliant character study of a sheltered young girl learning to take control of her life and her situation.

Muir's writing style remains absolutely unmatched, leaving me cackling out loud a times with her dexterous use of wit and clever turns of phrase. She has the ability to turn even the most mundane of sentences into something humorous, and she contrasts this skill with the startlingly dark and gory aspects of the story to create a compelling, darkly humous fantasy. I adored this novella, and can't wait to be thrilled and enchanted by whatever Muir tackles next.

I was already a fan of Tamsyn Muir's novels and the voice in this novella, while different, is equally great! It's kind of like Gail Carson Levine but with an edge. Another one I devoured in a single sitting, and sure to appeal to lovers of grown-up fairy tales and darkly funny fantasy.

In a word, delightful! This read like a darker, more grown-up Dealing with Dragons, and I'm sure that Patricia Wrede's many now-grown fans will devour it. I've been in a bit of a reading slump (pandemic brain can't focus) but I tore straight through this novella in a single evening -- I was dying to find out what would happen next, and very much enjoying the journey!

Technically I am the first person actually reviewing this book, the other five reviews are just all about how excited people are about it, which seems like a strange thing to put down instead of a review, but whatever. So onward…this is the other Christmas themed Subterranean Press book I downloaded from Netgalley. By far, the superior one. Firstly, Christmas is only kind of there as a proposed timetable sort of thing, Secondly, this is more along the lines of a proper book, size and story wise. Thirdly, it’s tons of fun. I enjoy fairy tales, but it’s a sort of thing that isn’t easy to update to suit a discerning discriminating adult reader. Many author have tried to do so with mixed results, there’s probably an entire genre of fairy tales for grown ups, or at least a subgenre within the fantasy category. Tamsyn Muir succeeded with flying colors. Muir is the new it author, getting lots of acclaim with her Gideon the Ninth, and it’s nice to know she hasn’t been hyped up for nothing, because as evidenced by this story, she’s got some writing chops. So here you have a classic fairy tale premise, a witch kidnaps a princess and locks her away in the forty flight tower. Like a proper tale (or a video game) each level features its own creature, so any prince trying to save her will have his work cut out for him. And if no prince succeeds and the winter is coming like it’s the last seasons of Game of Thrones and the only company the princess can find is in a snarky nonbinary (in the awesome casual way) fairy…then what…Well, read and find out. Sometimes if you want the job done right, you have to roll up your fancy sleeves and do it yourself…a terrific message for readers of all ages. Charming, fun, inventive, cute in exactly the right way and really, really humorous…this is the perfect Christmas fairy tale for most age readers. I enjoyed it very much. Absolutely loved the ending too. .And what a great introduction to a new author. Bravo, your royal majesty. Recommended. Thanks Netgalley.