I Am Princess X by Cherie Priest Review!

I Am Princess X

Author: Cherie Priest

Average Rating: 4.03/5.0

Personal Rating: 3.5/5.0

Page Count: 240

Publisher: Arthur A. Levine Books

Release Date: 26 May 2015

According to Goodreads:

Once upon a time, two best friends created a princess together. Libby drew the pictures, May wrote the tales, and their heroine, Princess X, slayed all the dragons and scaled all the mountains their imaginations could conjure.

Once upon a few years later, Libby was in the car with her mom, driving across the Ballard Bridge on a rainy night. When the car went over the side, Libby passed away, and Princess X died with her.

Once upon a now: May is sixteen and lonely, wandering the streets of Seattle, when she sees a sticker slapped in a corner window.

Princess X?

When May looks around, she sees the Princess everywhere: Stickers. Patches. Graffiti. There's an entire underground culture, focused around a webcomic at IAmPrincessX.com. The more May explores the webcomic, the more she sees disturbing similarities between Libby's story and Princess X online. And that means that only one person could have started this phenomenon - her best friend, Libby, who lives.

Purchase Links:

Amazon / Audible / Barnes & Noble / Book Depository / iBooks

My Opinion:

I had been seeing I Am Princess X floating around lately in the blog-o-sphere, so when I saw it at my library I decided to go ahead and pick it up. I don't have any big problems with the book, because the whole concept and story were pretty good. A bit random, but still entertaining. My biggest thing that kept throwing me, especially in the beginning when we meet Libby and May as kids, was how they were in fifth grade but they spoke like high schoolers. As the book went on, I kept thinking that the characters were older or younger at times, because of the way they spoke. 

I Am Princess X is written in third person and follows May, Libby's best friend, and Trick, a computer nerd who helps May track down Libby's whereabouts. I highly enjoyed reading from the third person point of view, because I have been reading a lot of books written in the first person. It was a nice change to be outside of the character's head for once. I will admit that third person makes it a bit harder to grow close to the characters, but I felt Priest did a great job portraying the emotions we should be having as the story progresses. Emotions, such as, fear, worry, and being in suspense along with the characters. The book is split into chapters with the majority of them following May as she tries to decipher the clues that she finds in the I Am Prince X web-comic. However, every once in awhile a chapter would follow Trick to see what he was up to with the whole mystery of Needle Man, Libby's captor. 

Since the novel was written in third person, it is a bit hard for you to truly get to know the characters. May is a determined girl who is searching for her should be dead best friend from three years ago. Libby, maybe or maybe not alive best friend, and her created a comic I Am Princess X when they were in fifth grade. May would do the writing, and Libby would do all the drawing. They continued to create scenarios for Princess X up until the point that Libby died...supposedly. We know that May's parents split soon after Libby's death, and now May goes back and forth between them. That's it though. Same goes for Trick. He is the pure definition of a computer nerd. He has this huge set up that lets him do all kinds of crazy things that you wouldn't be able to do with a normal computer. We know he had a full ride to University of Washington, but that was revoked when he didn't think through his actions too well while dealing with anger. We also know that he is on the short side, and it's something that has always and will always bother him. 

I love how the comic is dispersed through the novel, and how the clues are hidden in the comic for May to find in order to locate Libby. The comic also tells how the Needle Man kidnapped Libby for his reasons, and how he is on the hunt for her again since she ran away. Reading the comic was probably my favorite part of the book! I would recommend I Am Princess X to suspense lovers and cat and mouse chase lovers. This book will definitely not be for everyone, however I encourage everyone to give it a chance.