Whatever After 8 – Once Upon a Frog

Once Upon a Frog is the eighth Whatever After book by Sarah Mlynowski, a fairy tale comedy for 8 year olds about a frog prince, a dreadful princess and a dog who can't resist a ball.

What happens

Abby is ten and she's having a rubbish week. A boy called Brandon keeps calling her Crabby Abby. He tells her friend Robin she's stupid because she sees a writing tutor. Then he sneezes all over Abby's Mad Libs book (the fill-in-the-gaps word game). On purpose.

Her little brother Jonah has it worse. Somebody else's memories keep popping into his head, and one lands him in trouble in the middle of maths. They belong to the fairy who lives in the magic mirror down in the basement.

So the plan is to knock on the mirror at midnight and ask her for help. Just a chat. No fairy tales this time, and Abby is VERY clear about that.

Then their dog Prince wags his tail against the glass.

Abby lands at the bottom of a well in her pyjamas. There's a frog down there with her. He's very polite, he does push-ups and he says he's Prince Frederic.

Abby knows this story inside out, and she knows there's no kiss in the old version. The princess drops her golden ball down the well and the frog fetches it. Later she gets so cross that she throws him at a wall, and that's what turns him back.

So all Frederic has to do is catch a ball.

Guess who gets there first. (Prince LOVES a game of catch.)

The princess is horrible about it. She calls Prince a disgusting creature, then rides off for lunch and leaves a soaking wet girl stuck down a well.

Abby and Jonah usually wreck a fairy tale by accident. This time Abby decides the princess hasn't earned her happy ending, and she sets out to wreck it on purpose.

Abby tells it all herself, fast and bossy. She asks a question and answers it before you can. Does she want Brandon's germs on her book? No, she does not.

If your reader has a Brandon in their class, they'll probably enjoy how cross she gets. She'd quite like to turn him into an ant.

What to read next

Is Abby right about the kiss? Your reader can check. The Frog-King is the first story in The Complete Grimm's Fairy Tales, with the golden ball, the well and the wall all present and correct. The wording is old-fashioned (the frog asks the princess what ails her), so it's a nice one to read aloud together.