Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book, as this book has already been published, I will not share my review on Netgalley at this time.

First sentence: Mihi Whan Park was sitting in the library for indoor recess. Again. Two months ago, she'd: 1) discovered a portal to a fairy tale world 2) met Sleeping Beauty, Snow White's evil queen, and Goldilocks's three bears 3) survived a horde of enchanted ladies-in-waiting.

Premise/plot: Mihi and her (new) friends Reese and Savannah return to the dangerous fairy tale realm (the portal is a refrigerator in the school library). Though these three barely escaped the first time round, these three are back again for a second adventure. Why? Well, Genevieve, Mihi's nemesis (frenemy), has ventured into the realm. Mihi thinks that Genevieve will need help to survive and return. She surely knows that it took all three of them [Mihi, Reese, Savannah] to escape the first time. So much trickery and deceit in that realm.

Expect a giant, a beanstalk, and Jack in this second book.



My thoughts: The Rainbow Realm is topsy-turvy and unpredictable. Mihi and friends do have trouble detecting who is being honest and who is lying. To be fair, sometimes it's because they are just in a tough predicament where they have to make a decision to move forward. Even a bad mistake is movement forward. There are a lot of villains in this one. Few are just openly villainous. Many are "I'm just misunderstood" or "I'm trying to rewrite my story." A few villains they trust turn out to be honest (a wolf and fox), but others are just lying (a witch?).

I am not the intended audience for these--obviously. I think they are certainly entertaining...especially for kids in that intended age range. (Perhaps not so much for adults just for the fun of it.) These books--the first two--focus a lot on the tricky relationships. It is so tough to make friends and keep friends. Both books look at what makes a friend a good friend in addition to how to BE a friend even when the other person isn't the kindest or nicest.

I really enjoyed the first book of the series and knew I wanted to read the second book even though this is a middle grade series. This one fell a little flat to me but I still thought it was a solid book in the series. I still think middle graders will love this series. Especially if they were a fan of the first book. Thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for a copy of the arc in return for an honest review!