This was the first Munsch book that I bought and I quickly went out
and bought a whole load more. He's an excellent writer with a
wonderful range of stories and a beautifully simple and fluid style
of writing that is both accessible to children and able to roll off
the tongue of most adults.
As you'll see from the other reviews here, this tale is about a
young girl who, filled with nothing but courage, charity and a fair
bit of brains, goes off to rescue a young prince from a ferocious
dragon. After using all of her cunning to defeat the dragon she
discovers that the prince is a bit of a monster himself, and so she
decides not to marry him after all.
Although I agree that the story has a wealth of small lessons for
children to learn about boys and girls and expectations and
disappointments, I think that one of its strongest points is that
the book serves as a wonderful introduction to the fact that not
all stories end the way we expect them to (it's still a happy
ending, just a different one) and that sometimes a twist can be
more satisfying anyway.
Highly recommended for children from 3 to 103