This book did not disappoint! Just as good as those that came previously! Absolutely hilarious! Love the dynamic duo Kevin Hearne and Delilah Dawson!

Another great entry into the Tale of Pell series. Each entry is just as reverent and punny as the one before. I love that each tale intertwines characters and storylines from each of the earlier books like little easter eggs.

Thank you so much to Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine - Del Rey for the eARC in exchange for an honest review! All opinions are my own!

I have really enjoyed reading this entire series. Book three, The Princess Beard, picks right up in the world of Pell with more puns, more great characters, an epic adventure, and closure for some of my old favorites.

I think my favorite character in this one was the pirate captain. Filthy Lucre and all the ridiculous pirate rules in the manual were just hilarious. He was also a good character though, as were Morgan and Vic and Al, everyone on the journey had a rewarding character arc.

I have to say though the tampoons were a bit too much 😂

All in all though, everything from centaur anatomy to flesh hungry trees to a slew of cute but meat bound otters made this a memorable conclusion to the trilogy. I was glad to see Poltro and Toby back in the end with Gustave, and the book had a neat way of bringing the series back full circle.

Thank you so much again to the publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read this series!

A laugh out loud story of Pell. If you've not read any of Kevin Hearne and Delilah Dawson's books, I truly feel sorry for you. They write fairy tales that your mother never told you...or even heard of! An entertaining trip aboard an unusual pirate ship that will lead you to question every tale you heard before!

This series quickly became one of my favorites with each book that I read. It's a great read for people who love Terry Pratchett, staying true to the genre of parody fantasy. I love how the way that Delilah Dawson and Kevin Hearne incorporate pop culture into the the books, making sure that each page makes the readers laugh even if they do not entirely understand the reference that is being made. I felt as though this book was one of the weakest in the series, but that is just my personal opinion, but overall I still thoroughly enjoyed the entire book. The ending worked perfectly, tying together all of the series together. Even if the books were not necessarily connected, they still worked together perfectly to build the incredible world of Pell. I really hope that this is not the last book that they plan to release in this series, because I just love it so much. Even if they do not release anymore in the Pell, I would read whatever they cowrite because of how well they work perfectly together.

This was fun! There are a lot of puns, and the story plays around with several fairytale tropes: princess in a tower, pirate ship, chosen one..., and it plays with them all well.

This is the third installment in the Tales of Pell, and it contributed pretty well. Like the first two books, Kill the Farm Boy and No Country for Old Gnomes, it follows an assortment of characters: Morgan, the princess, Vic, a centaur trying to undo some magic, Tempest, a dryad who wants to be the first dryad lawyer, and Alobartalus, who wants to meet the Sn'archivist (side note, that is a perfect name for an archivist in a snarky series). The characters were funny and lovable, and it was also fun to see the return of old favorites like Poltro.

If you enjoy Shrek, Monty Python, Stardust, or The Princess Bride, you'll probably like The Princess Beard.

The Princess Beard
By Kevin Hearne Daliah Dawson
A satirical ride through myth and literature as a princess tries to find her way after a curse. The characters are cliche mythology figures from dryads to centaurs.. the creatures face an odyssey quest with satirical twist with hints for popular fiction from Harry Potter to Divergent.. its humor is outrageous and the twists unexpected..
Highly recommended for young adults.

The Princess Beard is a book that makes you think, even as you laugh until you cry. Much like the movie that the title references, this story is beautifully complex and multilayered. I have read it twice over, and know that there is still much left to uncover the next time I pick it up.

Honestly, it’s hard to decide where to start gushing. I adore fairy tales and their retellings. The premise of the princess rescuing herself and becoming a pirate is only the start of the story. At its heart, it is about facing your personal demons, and embracing them to find your true self. The fact that this is accomplished by challenging traditional gender roles or stereotypes (Vic and Morgan), or by having to face both the disapproval of family and an inevitable fate (Tempest), or by forging an entirely new path (Alobartalus); it is done with both grace and humor.

I adore excellent wordplay. I grew up reading both Xanth and the Callahan series. Puns fly frequently between SC and I. Kevin and Delilah have made a world replete with clever words and multiple meanings. There are macguffins, and anagrams. There is edge-of-your-seat action sandwiched between genuine feelings and laugh-out-loud hilarity. And at the very end, there is the warm fuzzy of finally coming home.

Do you enjoy books with a ridiculous amount of puns? Parodies of beloved movies and fairy tales? Humor that is only slightly offensive? Well, The Princess Beard, by Delilah S. Dawson, and Kevin Hearne, will certainly provide all of those things and more. The third, and final, installment in the series is even more entertaining than the previous books, with fun characters, and send ups of pop culture that will keep you laughing.

What I Liked:

Characters:

Each of the main characters are trying to figure out who they are beyond what society expects of them. There is Morgan, the runaway princess who would much rather be a pirate, Al, the elf who hates that his kind are tricksters, Tempest, a dryad who dreads becoming a man-eating tree, and Vic, the Centaur who is drowning in toxic masculinity. Each character is richly drawn and has a journey that I thoroughly enjoyed following.

Story:

I appreciated each character's story and that the authors gave equal weight to all. The pirate princess's story was just as important as Vic's. And each story told a different tale of how we need to stop trying to conform to stereotypes and forge our own path.

Along the way, there were very funny parodies of Harry Potter, fast-food chains, food politics, toxic masculinity, and corporate culture.

Series Ending:

As I looked at the ratings I gave the previous books, my enthusiasm (and star rating) has increased with each novel. What started out as a series of silly puns loosely strung together into a story has become a world of richly drawn societies and characters.

I loved that the ending of The Princess Beard brought back some story lines from the previous books to tie together all the various characters and themes.

You wake up out of a long sleep and realize you've grown a beard and hair that's been used as a climbing rope. Also remembering you're to marry someone you don't want to, so you do the only sensible thing, run away. Disguised by her beard, Morgan takes off early on and joins forces with a pirate and her adventures start. Personal growth of all the characters occurs while they face many perils and learn to work together as a team. Not quite as silly as the previous books, but still in the same vein with a good planned out adventure and story telling. I enjoyed this one the most. Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for a fun read.

You know what I hate about this book? The fact that this is the third one in the series and I never got around to reading the first two! I saw them on Netgalley, and never picked them up and I could just kick myself. I LOVED this book!

What a joy this book was. Irreverent, silly and hilarious. I found myself literally laughing out loud. I would read lines out to my 11 year old daughter and she giggled like a fiend. We both really enjoyed it and now thanks to this book we call the box holding my cats litter box the “boom boom room”. One of the things I love about this book is that while it is so funny it is also inclusive. See comedy isn’t dead just because we expect more from comedians than the old tired way of punching down on people who are marginalized.

You won’t be sorry if you get a copy of this book, I had a ton of fun reading it. It sped by and kept my interest the entire time. Now I just need to buy the first two in the series!

Thank you to NetGalley and DelRey for providing me an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. I really enjoyed the previous books in this series (Kill the Farm Boy and No Country for Old Gnomes). I knew what I was getting myself into here and knew it would be some much needed levity after reading some heavy non-fiction, fantasy and science fiction titles. The Princess Beard follows the title character, a dryad, a centaur swoleboy, and an un-elfly elf on a piratical journey to buried treasure and to find themselves. This is similar to how the previous books start, but the similarities stop there. If a bearded princess isn't funny enough, this book has something everyone: talking parrot pirate captain, elf butts, a swoleboy centaur with un-swole tea magic, otter balls, humans being assholes, dwarf glutes, and on and on. The book will keep you laughing (and reading) through to the end of the acknowledgements.

The book is somewhat self contained from the previous installments with only a few crossover characters and references.

The Lady Harkovrita, whose sleeping form made an appearance in Kill the Farm Boy, awakens from her sleeping curse only to discover the following: 1) Her room smells like something died in it, 2) her fingernails and toenails are horrifically long and curly and tangled together, 3) her hair is trailing out the window like a rope ladder, and 4) she has a beard. Recalling her unwanted betrothal to Lord Vas Deference of Taynt and her hatred of all the ladylike expectations heaped upon her, she decides to escape her tower and go on an adventure, changing her name to the much more gender-neutral Morgan and embracing her luxurious new beard. Along the way, she meets such colorful characters as a dudebro centaur who's a "Krossfit" enthusiast, a dryad who wants to become a lawyer, an elf who dreams of becoming the next sn'archivist, and a pirate captain who's a parrot. Many shenanigans and puns ensue.

As with the other novels, this centers on a cast of characters in the process of figuring out who they are, what they want in life, and how to break free from the emotional baggage that keeps them from understanding and accepting themselves. For example, the toxic masculinity the centaur's father imposed on him makes him ashamed of his tea magic. The dryad's healing magic has a personal cost that makes her wary of being manipulated, to the point that she's afraid to help anyone. As with the other novels, the characters experience a whole lot of personal growth and epiphany as they develop deep friendships and aid each other through hilariously disastrous situations.

The series has always poked fun at fantasy tropes and satirized famous fantasy media. The Princess Beard takes a sharper satirical bent than the other novels in the series, in a way that is not at all out of character for the series, just more focused and incisive. One of my favorite scenes in the novel involves sirens attempting to lure sailors to their doom, and they begin by promising money with which to bribe politicians for lower tax rates.

This is the third book in the series. While it can be read perfectly well as a standalone, it does contain some spoilers for previous books in the series. Several characters have appeared in previous books, but this isn't one of those series that follows a core cast of characters over time. Personally, I always prefer to read these sorts of series in publication order so I can pick up on nods to things that happened in other books. You'll have no trouble at all if you decide to start here, though.

This series remains some of the funniest and most delightful reading I've enjoyed over the last few years. If you're a fan of Monty Python and want to read something that is the exact opposite of grimdark, I highly recommend The Princess Beard, as well as the earlier books in the series, Kill the Farm Boy and No Country for Old Gnomes. The Tales of Pell series is kind and optimistic, yet isn't afraid to lampoon difficult topics such as toxic masculinity.

The Princess Beard by Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne is the third hilariously entertaining installment of The Tales of Pell. Think Sleeping Beauty decides to start a new life for herself after she wakes up and become a pirate on a ship with quite the ragtag crew. Doesn't that sound like fun? For the most part, it really worked for me. I love how the authors are so successfully able to turn classic fairytale elements on their ear. I loved that here we get to catch up with some characters that we got to meet earlier on in the series. If you're a fan of Monty Python and the Holy Grail and The Princess Bride, I highly recommend giving this series a try.

I liked this entry in the Tales of Pell series better than Kill the Farm Boy, but not as much as No Country for Old Gnomes (which actually moved me to tears). The authors’ signature offbeat humor remains intact, and I loved the links (some subtle, some less so) to previous books in the series. The pop culture references felt fresh and relevant, and all in all The Princess Beard was exactly what I expected, in the best possible way.

I was particularly interested in the character of Tempest, a dryad who was released from a slavery contract and wants to be a lawyer to help others in similar predicaments. Her story briefly turns into a quite entertaining Harry Potter parody, and it’s been long enough since I read those books that the reminder was nostalgic and fun. Bogtorts is definitely nothing like a real law school, but it was one of my favorite things in the book. Roachcraw for life.

I also enjoyed following Alobartalus, an elf who’s really not very elf-like at all, and works at basically the elf tourist trap until he decides to make his own way in the world. His somewhat cynical point of view was one I found relatable.

Although she was the main character, I wasn’t as crazy about Morgan! She didn’t annoy me at all, but she was surrounded by characters with somewhat more interesting motivations and mannerisms.

If I had a complaint about this book, it would be that the humor toes the line between hilariously crass and just kinda gross. There’s one section that’s basically just an extended period joke, and I didn’t find it to be very smart or engaging humor, as I know this series is capable of. On the flip side, the words “elf butts” had me absolutely rolling a few chapters later, and I highly recommend you pick up this book to find out why.

The Princess Beard is another fantastic installment of Delilah Dawson and Kevin Hearn's Tales of Pell series. Following the madcap adventures of Lady Harkovrita, who after awakening from a magical sleep sporting a headache and a beard, decides that she has been given the opportunity to escape from a dreadful marriage and runs away from her castle. Along the way, she learns how to become a pirate, makes many interesting friends, and embarks on wacky adventures full of pun-filled goodness. It's wild, it's wacky, and it's absolute wonderful. Highly enjoyable and incredibly funny, The Princess Beard is a great addition to the series.
Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions are my own.

The Tales of Pell series is obviously a string of parodies, and this one is just as obviously a play on The Princess Bride. I certainly enjoyed the first book in the series, titled Kill the Farm Boy. The second book, No Country for Old Gnomes, failed to capture my interest and I didn’t finish it. This third installment, however, was just as good as the first.

Perhaps the problem with NCFOG was that it appeared to be a play on the tropes of The Hobbit, and I’m not a Tolkien fan. The movies were well enough, but my attempts to read LotR failed multiple times before even getting through the party scene. You have no idea how many of my fantasy-loving friends I’ve disappointed in that fact, but it is, sadly, a fact. I also suspect that, perhaps, John Scalzi’s rule that: The failure mode of clever is asshole at least partially applies. I found the gnomes irritating and didn’t even get out of their village before I quit.

On the other hand, our PB characters are quite the laugh riot. There’s Morgan, our titular bearded — and gender-fluid — princess who becomes a pirate. Tempest, a dryad with healing abilities whose fate is to become a carnivorous tree, joins the crew with the aim of being a lawyer who helps the poor and unfortunate. Alobartalus is the requisite half-breed elf who wants to meet his hero, the Sn’archivist, who talks to gods. Then there’s what has to be my favorite character: Vic, the swole gym-bro centaur whose toxic masculinity is balanced by his magical ability to summon sweetly decorated pastries and delicate cups of steaming tea. And then, of course, there’s pirate captain Filthy Lucre, who is the most lovable talking parrot I’ve encountered since Aladdin’s Iago.

As I said in my review of the first book in the series: you can tell the authors are clearly having fun with this. I don’t think they always quite reach the heights of humor that they think they do, but The Princess Beard is a nice addition to the series, and is just as entertaining as Kill the Farm Boy was. If you enjoyed that one, you’ll enjoy this. The book drops on October 8th at book stores near you.

"Shave the princess? Inconceivable! The hilarious bestselling authors of Kill the Farm Boy and No Country for Old Gnomes are back with a new adventure in the irreverent world of Pell.

Once upon a time, a princess slept in a magical tower cloaked in thorns and roses.

When she woke, she found no Prince Charming, only a surfeit of hair and grotesquely long fingernails - which was, honestly, better than some creep who acted without consent. She cut off her long braids and used them to escape. But she kept the beard because it made a great disguise.

This is not a story about finding true love’s kiss - it's a story about finding yourself. On a pirate ship. Where you belong.

But these are no ordinary pirates aboard The Puffy Peach, serving under Filthy Lucre, the one-eyed parrot pirate captain. First there’s Vic, a swole and misogynistic centaur on a mission to expunge himself of the magic that causes him to conjure tea and dainty cupcakes in response to stress. Then there’s Tempest, who’s determined to become the first dryad lawyer - preferably before she takes her ultimate form as a man-eating tree. They’re joined by Alobartalus, an awkward and unelfly elf who longs to meet his hero, the Sn’archivist who is said to take dictation directly from the gods of Pell. Throw in some mystery meat and a dastardly capitalist plot, and you’ve got one Pell of an adventure on the high seas!

In this new escapade set in the magical land of Pell, Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne lovingly skewer the tropes of fairy tales and create a new kind of fantasy: generous, gently humorous, and inclusive. There might also be otters."

I hope I'm not the only one who thinks ALL books should reference The Princess Bride. It should actually be a law.

The Princess Beard is the third and final installment of the Tales of Pell fantasy parody series from Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne. I adored the first book Kill the Farmboy and was a little lukewarm on the sequel No Country For Old Gnomes, but the final book is a good marriage between the two.

I think what made me like the final book better than the second one was that the main characters in this book are ones we have met before. So I already a had some connection to them, whereas with the second book I didn't really know those characters. I kind of also loved the plot of a Princess that is just like, "nah, I don't want to marry a lord, I'm going to become a pirate instead."

There are a lot of characters in this one so I did think that at times it was hard to keep up with them all. Especially since they all seem to have some sort of issue they are working through. I did like that with Vic it tried to tackle overcoming toxic masculinity. That was pretty cool to see in a book that had a lot of crude humor in it.

The humor in this one is pretty much on par with the other books. I don't mind crude humor, but if that's not really your thing you might want to pass on this one. I was definitely laughing at some of the stuff, but some of it I felt like I had to read it out loud to really get the joke. So this series might be better on audio!

I do think this is a fun series and if you like fantasy parodies like Monty Python or the podcast Hello From The Magic Tavern, I definitely recommend this one!

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with this book in exchange for my honest opinion. This will be available in stores on October 8th.

I loved both Kill the Farm Boy and No Country for Old Gnomes (Pell #1 and #2), but this one failed to drum up much enthusiasm for me. That’s not to say I hated it. I just felt very apathetic about it in general. It wasn’t bad, it just…wasn’t.

The Pell books thus far have been highly ridiculous and incredibly punny, which is the kind of humor I appreciate. The Princess Beard kept the jokes coming, but I think that there were so many squeezed in that I didn’t get a chance to appreciate them all. At times, it seemed like the authors were just trying to hard.

It’s unfortunate because the first two books are so stinking funny that I was hoping for a home run on the entire series. However, don’t count these books out. The first two are absolutely worth reading and, even being just so-so for me, the third book is still better than many other satirical fantasies out there. It just wasn’t my thing.

Have you read this? Thoughts?