Magdalen is on her way to marry Steffan, Duke of Wolfberg, when her maid demands to chance places with her. When they arrive, Magdalen soon discovers that not all is as it should be. Steffan arrives home to discover that his scheming uncle has replaced Steffan with Steffan's cousin. Together Magdalen and Steffan must prove their identities, save the people of Wolfberg, stay alive, figure out out the uncle's goal, and potentially fall in love.

I liked this one very much. It was predictable; by the end of the 4th chapter, I had a clear view of the ending. But books like this are like chick flicks. We all know how they will end, it's the journey and the emotions that make the book good. I enjoyed this journey and was happy at the ending.

As this is one of my current favorite authors, I was excited to find this pre-release NetGalley title available for my honest review! As it turned out this new book had a great storyline, with a mostly good accumulation of characters, both good and evil. However, it seemed a bit forced to me. The writing seemed in need of further development and/or editing, and the flow was sometimes interrupted. Is Dickerson facing tighter deadlines, forcing a slightly underdeveloped product?

Don't get me wrong, this was still a fun book, but not as fully refined as The Beautiful Pretender - now that is solid and just wonderful. This sequel barely seemed related - Magdalen and sometimes Steffan did not seem like the same characters. Magdalen's mother could have been more developed, and their relationship possibly improved. The conclusion was less developed where Lord Hazen was concerned (and others too) and less satisfying; in fact instead it seemed just an enumeration of who ended up where. Several German phrases in the book could have included an English translation in context for easier understanding.

But I loved the goose girl & shepherd connection and it was an interesting twist on The Prince & the Pauper. I love the Christian and faith filled references. The plot was satisfying and entertaining. This was still a fun Melanie Dickerson offering!

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1920536960

Another creative romantic adventure tale set in Medieval Germany!
Following closely on the heels of The Beautiful Pretender, this story starts out in 1365 in the Barony of Mallin, a neighboring kingdom of Thornbeck. Loosely based on the Grimm fairy tale, The Goose Girl, the heroine in this tale suffers betrayal and danger, leaving her alone and vulnerable in desperate circumstances. A perfect set up for a hero. Only the man she hoped would rescue her is in the same boat. True valor, good character--chivalrous and faithful--cannot be hidden for long though, and together the pair find hope in their dark situation.
Magdalan is a sweet character, and her goodness humbles everyone around her. Steffan would have had to been blind to not notice her--she totally stands out. He needs a little work on his communication skills though. Don't we all? Some extra action and developing romance towards the last half made this a more engaging read later on. I wasn't sure where this pair would actually end up.
Recommend for readers who enjoy clean historical romances with a bit of adventure and faith. Can be read as a stand alone, but it helps to read The Beautiful Pretender first to understand overlapping characters.

LOVED this book!! Mrs. Dickerson continues to write very entertaining and engaging books-- I love these "retelling" of fairytales. She does an amazing job! I have shared with many friends how wonderful her books (including this one) are!!

The Noble Servant is the third installment from A Medieval Fairy Tale series. I enjoyed this story. Steffan and Magdalen were wonderful characters and loved how they interacted with one another.
I thought this book was a pretty good read and recommend it.
4 stars

Melanie Dickerson has done it again!! A wonderful and clean novel that will keep you on your toes until the very end!!

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas Nelson for a free copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review!

[Note: Where it says description, that's where I've inserted gifs but they didn't show up on this site.]
I Received this ARC from Thomas Nelson Fiction via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
And trust me, this review will be brutally honest.
Now, I hate writing scathing reviews almost as much as I like reading them but I’ve learned that in life, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. I didn’t find The Noble Servant to my liking and I feel like I have to justify my reasoning, seeing as there are many positive reviews for this book.
First of all, I think I may have started reading it on the wrong foot and with completely skewed expectations. You see, I didn’t really know the author and so thought I was getting a book like Shannon Hale’s The Goose Girl. I mean come on, look at the cover.
However, as I read through the first chapter, I felt a little cheated. It wasn’t awful but it wasn’t what I was expecting. Instead of this:
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I got this:
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I can’t even find the right words to convey my disappointment, seeing as The Goose Girl is one of my favorite books and this one didn’t even come close to it. But, being the mature person that I am, I reeled in my despair and decided to give Melanie Dickerson a fair trial. I even checked out two of her other books, The Captive Maiden and The Beautiful Pretender. I liked the latter the best out all three because of the interesting premise but it still wasn't the epitome of a great story.
I tried.
I really, really tried but I could not get into this book.
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The characters were all flat, the plot was all flat, and the writing was all flat and I don’t just mean flat because they were all squished in between the pages of a 300-page book. No, no, NO!
I liked Magdalen in The Beautiful Pretender but in this book, she seemed to have lost that vital whatever it was that made her an interesting character in the other book. Maybe it was too much screen page time, I don’t know. She was contradictory in the worst sense of the word. See, she wants to help her people but she doesn’t seem to have a problem looking down on servants and animals. I kept hoping Magdalen would be like Ani from The Goose Girl who had a horse, whom she adored, and who actually connected to the geese and befriended the servants, instead of look down upon them, but that never happened with Magdalen. It felt like the author couldn't decided who Magdalen was. Either she's a nice person or not, because sometimes Melanie Dickerson tried hard to make her pitiable and compassionate and then I turned the page only to find Magdalen thinking about hanging people and stabbing people in their sleep. And don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind when the characters have a little blackness in their heart but it just wasn’t executed properly in this book.
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Then there was Steffan. Oh Steffan. I wanted to like him, very much, but alas, it was not meant to be. He fell into the same trap as Maggie and that was annoying, self-contradictory behavior of I’m innocent and Off with their heads and I wuv her but I kant mavvy her. Boohoo, is that all you care about?
Also, neither of the protagonists acted like well-educated individuals. The readers were just told that they were.
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Other characters were very simple caricatures of villains and servants. I didn’t care for any of them, except maybe Lenhart. I wanted to say I wish there was more of him in the book but I’m afraid that would just ruin him just as it ruined Magdalen.
Ok, as for the plot. I think it was a good idea, a great one actually but I wished it was executed better. Like, why were the villains so obviously evil and stupid? Hazen and Elrich, I’m looking at you. I can’t tell you what they did because I don’t want to be spoilering my review but it was so far out of the realm of believable that I couldn’t find any cares to give for the protagonists. Like come on, there are so many loopholes in the villains’ master plans that I’m surprised they got as far as they did.
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Maybe that’s why the story felt like it was dragging. The villains were so clearly bad at their jobs that the author had to keep coming up with boring and lazy ways to stop the characters from achieving their goals.
And finally, we come to the writing. It was simplistic and read like a book for children. The descriptions were vague, as in I couldn’t imagine the world the story was taking place in. And the dialogue was redundant and halting and sometimes it didn’t even seem to matter to the story. Also there were too many German words without translation. Now, I like the inclusion of another language, but please be kind enough to translate it, instead of making the readers guess at it and interrupting the flow of the story.
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In the end, I didn’t care for the book nor for Magdalen and Steffan. The only reason it got two stars from me and not one is because of the premise. It was really, really good, but unfortunately, everything else couldn’t hold up the weight of all that potential. And there was potential.
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This story was great! I really enjoyed it. Most especially since the kissing and "romance" were kept towards the end of the book when the main characters were actually betrothed. I really loved this and found it very admirable in Mrs. Dickerson keeping up the tension and interest of the reading in the main characters story even while waiting until the right moment for them to kiss.

The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale was a book I read as an early teen and I personally loved reading about the girl working with the geese in the fields. When I heard this book was a retelling of the Goose girl, I wondered if it would contain that element. I am happy to report it did! The scenes with the main characters looking after their respective flock and gaggle were some of my favorite parts...and the humor that flowed between them was quite fun to read.

Definitely another good read for teens!

Melanie Dickerson did it again. I truly enjoyed The Noble Servant, her latest installment in her A Medieval Fairy Tale series. With brave and heroic characters and a plot that keeps on moving to the conclusion, I had a hard time putting the novel down. I finished it in one day.

As always, Dickerson grips me with how well she can bring this historical time period to life. I honestly feel like I'm roaming the castles, the field, and glancing at the sea with the characters. I enjoy her attention to detail and how she captures my imagination as I spend a couple of hours in the past. While the research flows from the previous novels, I did not have a hard time swallowing anything she presented in her novel. It flowed seamlessly and presented an united story.

This time around, I watched Lady Magdalen and Steffan as they were forced into a treacherous situation where they had to hide their true identity or be killed. While Magdalen and Steffan grew into their roles as the geese and sheep herder, their bravery and compassion for the less fortunate shone on the page. While trying to keep their true identity a secret, they stood up for the underbelly of society and took their beatings. The downside to their characters is that Magdalen and Steffan were nice people at the beginning of the story and stayed the same way throughout. No character transformations.

The romance was slow moving, which is how I like it. Steffan and Magdalen would spend many hours talking together, learning more and more about each other and falling in love as an end result. What girl doesn't want a guy who will listen and share his ideas with them? I enjoyed Steffan and could completely understand why Magdalen fell in love with him. On the other hand, the plot moved at a nice pace, especially after they escaped from the castle and where on the hunt from Steffan's uncle. It was a nice change of pace to see them trying to survive in the mines without rushing the story along.

Dickerson's The Noble Servant is a great continuation of her Medieval Fairy Tales with a wonderful romantic story between well-deserving characters who are on the hunt to right a evil plot against them. I highly recommend this book to young and mature adults alike. This is a book that should be bought and placed on the keeper shelf.

I received a complimentary copy of Melanie Dickerson's The Noble Servant from Thomas Nelson Publishing and the opinions stated are all my own.

The third installment of the Melanie Dickerson's Medieval Fairy Tale collection tells the story of Magdalen, Avaelina's confidant in The Beautiful Pretender. Two years have passed, and Magdalen's family fortunes have fallen further—leaving her with little hope of finding a suitable marriage. When she receives an invitation to come to Wolfberg Castle to marry Steffan, she eagerly accepts. After all, she's thought about him plenty since she first met him at Thornbeck Castle. The opportunity to escape from her disapproving mother is an added bonus.

Along the way, unscrupulous servants conspire against her, leaving her penniless and without hope. When she arrives at Wolfberg Castle, she discovers something foul afoot. Will she ever find true love? Will she ever escape the drudgery of herding geese? Has Staffan really changed so much in two years? Or has something truly evil happened at Wolfberg?

You won't want to miss this fast-paced book with well-developed characters who struggle with universal questions about human relationships.

Another lovely story by Melalnie Dickerson! This one moved at a slower pace than some of her other stories, but the love story was natural and sweet, and one I enjoyed watching unfold. You cannot go wrong with a Melanie Dickerson fairy tale retelling! If you're a fan of her other novels you will definitely want to add this one to your collection.

When I pick up a Melanie Dickerson book it's very easy to predict that it will be a predictable, but cute read. But maybe this time it might have been a bit to predictable. There were literally no moments of surprise and I thought the love story was flat. The fairy tale element that Dickerson so well in previous books includes felt a bit pushed to the side and there was just something missing for me. I wanted there to be more sparks between our couple, a chemistry that would excite and make me giggle. But I felt a bit indifferent to them.

Not one of her best.