Do Not Disturb the Dragons

Michelle Robinson's Do Not Disturb the Dragons is a giggly fantasy for 5 year olds about a princess who'd much rather be a knight.

What happens

The kingdom of Wondermere has a LOT of rules. The most important one is DO NOT disturb the dragons, whose nests sit high up on the castle turrets and keep the whole kingdom lucky.

Grace arrived at the castle on the orphan cart when she was two. She promptly climbed a turret and sat in a dragon's nest, covered in jewels and dragon poo. The king adopted her on the spot, and she's grown up as a twin sister to Princess Portia.

But girls DO NOT become knights. They don't ride unicorns, wear armour or play troll-o (a sport where knights on unicorns whack a very willing troll through a hoop). Grace thinks the rules are stupid. Portia agrees. So the pair of them smuggle some old armour out under their petticoats and start training in secret.

It's brilliant chaos. Their armour rusts solid overnight, so they sneak into their snoring tutor's room to borrow his troll spit. Grace tames a wild unicorn and accidentally names him Poop (there's a lot of poo in this book, and all of it is lucky).

Poop is the star. He does the exact opposite of whatever Grace tells him. So she begs him to stand still and keep eating, and off he gallops!

It's lovely on sisters, too. Grace is the bold one and Portia is the bookish one who knows every magical creature by heart. They're completely on each other's side.

Who hasn't been told at some point that something isn't for them? Grace's answer is to get on a unicorn and prove everyone wrong, and little ones will cheer her all the way.

At this age it's one to read aloud together, a chapter or two at a time.

What to read next

If they fall for Grace and her grotty unicorn, there's another royal Grace who can't curtsy in Princess Disgrace. It starts on her first day at princess school, when the other princesses mistake her for a hairy beast.