My daughter was first introduced to Fancy Nancy in our local library. I suspected that she would not care for these types of books after all, she is not a girly girl at all. Dressing up fancifully is not her idea of a good time! What I found was that the amount of vocabulary contained in each book keeps my daughter engaged! She loves the harder more complicated words in these Fancy Nancy books!

In this book, Nancy and her friend Bree are speaking French and planning Bree's birthday party. Poor Nancy is heartbroken when she learns that she can't go to Bree's birthday party as her grandparents' anniversary party is at the same time! Nancy sulks and wears black in mourning for the party she will miss. She only speaks to her doll in French on the train to her grandparents' house. Nancy appreciates the hotel's fanciness and loved all of the bottles of potions. Readers see Nancy and her doll in full green facial mask, fingernails freshly painted, hair in towels, wrapped in a bath towel. All dressed up in fancy dress, Nancy has a ball at the party. She apologizes to her mom for how she acted before as she really is enjoying this party. Her grandmother lets them know about a butterfly garden in town and they head out to see the butterflies. There Nancy looks so fancy in her brightly colored dress that she almost blends into the background of flowers and butterflies floating around her. Anyone who knows anything about Nancy in the Fancy Nancy books know that she loves to use fancy words rather than plain simple words. She also loves to dress as fancifully as she can. A very cute little girl with just a touch of teenage angst and sass. She will remind many a grown woman of their own girlhood!

As always the first thing you notice about Fancy Nancy is her very feminine, very fancy dress. From her hairstyles to her slippers, you can't miss every detail! Bree's bedroom is as dainty as the girls with pink colors everywhere as well as butterfly accents. Nancy looks to be about six years old and has a little sister who looks about three years old. I enjoy seeing her mother and father being so patient in the face of outright sulliness. Knowing smiles are passed between them as Nancy sulks and pouts. Her mother looks genuinely sorry that Nancy will have to miss her friend's party, not stern in the least about it. This 30 page book has one to eight lines of text and some of the text almost looks cursive. I am sure the writing it made that way to look more fanciful and it is very pretty but hard for younger readers to read who haven't learned cursive yet. The color pictures fill each page but there are also items labelled for even more words added to the text amount. A few French words are thrown in as well as harder words such as iridescent, azure, automatic, and glamorous. Fancy Nancy books are always a treat to read together with your child. My daughter and I enjoy them probably for different reasons...I enjoy little Nancy's fancy style and my daughter enjoys her use of language! Recommended for ages 5 and up with assistance from an adult.

What is so good about this children's book?

Extra vocabulary words, fun story, Nancy's sense of style, gorgeous pictures, girly, hard words are explained within the story

What is unique about it?

Extensive use of language but any hard words are explained usually in the same sentence.

There has to be some bad to it, right?

Almost cursive writing.

Any warnings?

None.

Final verdict:

Fancy Nancy books are always a treat to read together with your child. My daughter and I enjoy them probably for different reasons...I enjoy the little Nancy's fancy style and my daughter enjoy's her use of language!