I feel like this is a younger, less violent, sister to [b:Graceling|3236307|Graceling|Kristin Cashore|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xYPjLFCTL._SL75_.jpg|3270810] and [b:The Hunger Games|2767052|The Hunger Games (Hunger Games, #1)|Suzanne Collins|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1209501026s/2767052.jpg|2792775]. Fortunata is so aggressively self-reliant; she just struck me as the sort of girl who could grow up into a Katsa or Katniss if the circumstances required. Plus she’s smart and resourceful and funny. I love how the story suggests that trusting yourself and working for what you want will get you a happy ending you might not have even dared to dream about.

With all the best bits of fairytales popping-up, and a girl who doesn’t always get things right but doesn’t give up hope, I think this is a great read for kids and tweens. It would probably be really fun as a read aloud as well.
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A fresh homage to the fairy tale tradition. Very brave and smart girl, who shows us how magical and thrilling life & the world & love can be, despite no actual magic. Clean and accessible for children as young as 9 or so, even though the girl is 17. ( )

A quick-paced fairy tale about a false prophecy, royal deception and the love of a prince.

Fortunata and her father have fallen on hard times since her mother’s death. They end up joining a group of traveling performers and Fortunata learns the deception of telling fortunes to make money. She ends up being tricked into spinning a grand fortune for a prince; Fortunata prophecies that a hidden princess will be found and proven by the fitting of a golden slipper but first the slipper must be obtained from a witch in the woods who will be defeated by a weapon found by the prince. The kindgom’s future leadership rests on this elaborate story and Fortunata has to ensure it all comes true or her father will be killed. However her “prophecy” never accounted for her falling in love with the prince herself.

An absorbing read for those who appreciate a sweeping, romantic fairy tale and a strong female character who’s not afraid to take matters into her own hands. ( )

When Fortunata's mother dies, and her gentle father - believing that the fairies had abandoned him - loses his shoe-making skills, the young girl must grow up fast, shouldering the burden of caring for herself and her befuddled parent. Fleeing the city of Valenzia, after she makes an enemy of Captain Niccolo of the Guard, Nata and her father fall in with a traveling fortune-teller, and her violent companion. With her quick wit, and keen eye for detail, Nata is soon training as a fortune-teller herself, although she has no belief in magic or divination. But when she is forced to make a prophecy for the royal family of Doma, and her father's life depends on that prophecy being fulfilled, Nata finds herself setting out, in the company of Prince Leonato, to make fairy-tales come true...

This book came highly recommended by a number of friends, some of whom are far stricter than I, when it comes to rating children's fantasy, so when it was chosen as this month's Children's Fiction Club selection, I was quite excited to read it. Unfortunately, although I found it an enjoyable story, on the surface level, it failed to really engage me, emotionally or intellectually. The settings, whether Valenzia, Doma, or the Black Wood, never felt entirely real to me, and I couldn't take the characters wholly to heart. I liked the allusions to various fairy-tales - the Cinderella-esque slippers, the Rapunzel-ish long-haired princess in the tower - but although I am sympathetic to this sort of project, and deeply interested in the fantasy and retold fairy-tale genre, Fortune's Folly felt a little flat to me. Still, I did enjoy it, it read fairly smoothly, and as it's a first attempt on author Deva Fagan's part, I'll probably give her work another try, at some point. ( )

This is a charming fairytale with a clever heroine. It's also squeaky clean, suitable for the 8 and up princess-struck set, I'd think. It would be great fun to read aloud to someone all wrapped up in pink and glittery pajamas. There's plenty of adventure, a little bit of derring-do but never any actual gore. I look forward to seeing what comes next from Fagan's pen.

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