It's just another day chasing squirrels in the park for Twinkie the dog, until she runs through a portal in a tree and is unwittingly reborn as an intergalactic princess!
Now inhabiting the form of Princess Trixie, a 16-year-old princess who lives on a space carriage, Kalaxia Limo One, she must navigate the complexities of royal life while grappling with her dog-turned-human identity. To make matters worse, it turns out she is betrothed to a prince from another world, catching her right in the midst of a power struggle between mighty empires. Even her ladies-in-waiting struggle to keep the suddenly erratic Princess Trixie from self-inflicted, yet unintended, chaos.
In this quirky young adult novel, humor abounds as the once-canine Trixie attends official dinners, dodges scheming nobles, and fends off suitors, all while trying to find a way back to her former life on Earth. With powerful motives and sinister plots at war in this new world, Trixie must discover whom she can trust – and whether returning home is even possible anymore.
It's just another day chasing squirrels in the park for Twinkie the dog, until she runs through a portal in a tree and is unwittingly reborn as an intergalactic princess!
Now inhabiting the form of Princess Trixie, a 16-year-old princess who lives on a space carriage, Kalaxia Limo One, she must navigate the complexities of royal life while grappling with her dog-turned-human identity. To make matters worse, it turns out she is betrothed to a prince from another world, catching her right in the midst of a power struggle between mighty empires. Even her ladies-in-waiting struggle to keep the suddenly erratic Princess Trixie from self-inflicted, yet unintended, chaos.
In this quirky young adult novel, humor abounds as the once-canine Trixie attends official dinners, dodges scheming nobles, and fends off suitors, all while trying to find a way back to her former life on Earth. With powerful motives and sinister plots at war in this new world, Trixie must discover whom she can trust – and whether returning home is even possible anymore.
Prologue
Squiwel! There he is. Squiwel! Squiwel! Squiwel!
Gonna get you, squiwel. This time I will. I just know it.
Mama drops the leash. “Twinkie! Get back here!” Mama might get lost without me, but I don’t care. I’ll find her later. “Bad dog!” Bad? You’re the one who dropped the leash. Squiwel!
Run run run. Catch him catch him catch him! Squiwel!
Oh no! Not again! Stupid twees! Squiwel went up a twee! I hate you, twee! Come down! Come down now, squiwel! Squiwel!
“Snicker snicker snicker!” Squiwel taunts me from the twee. Stupid squiwel. Always the same squirrel. Running away. Taunting me. I can’t believe I lost again. Come down! Come down! Come down!
Oh wait, what is that? A hole at the bottom of the twee! It’s big. It’s lit up with all different colors. Is this an elevator? Like in Grammy’s big house in the smelly city? It must be an elevator! I get you now! Going up! Then we can finally play together!
I dash into the hole and . . .
Chapter 1: A New Beginning
Huh? What happened? This smells different. In fact, it doesn’t smell at all. Where is the tree? Where are the smells? Is my nose broken? I don’t remember breaking my nose.
“Squirrel!” I call to the sky—no, it’s a ceiling now. Ceiling? Where am I? And my bark? It sounded really weird. Almost . . . human? Like Mama? Can I finally ask her for lunch now? I’m so excited. “Mama, when’s lunch? What’s for lunch?” I practice.
Then I look down. Human food! Right in front of me! Did it work? Is this lunch?
I’m at a table! It finally happened! Dream come true! This is lunch! It looks like a bowl of tasty water with human food in it.
Lap lap lap! Huh? What’s wrong with my tongue? It’s so small and useless. I bring my paw up to my mouth to feel it on my fur. Then I can figure out my tongue problem. Oh my Dog! Human hands? Where are my paws?
Then I notice. Oh no. A whole table of humans is staring at me—humans I don’t know. That’s the dangerous kind. But I feel like staring at me too. What’s wrong with me? This dream come true feels very wrong. This isn’t the lunch I always wanted. Where did that tree elevator take me? Where’s my squirrel friend? “Squirrel!”
“Is this truly the princess you wish my son to marry in two weeks?” some old man wrapped in a very comfy-looking blue blanket yells across the table, his human finger pointed at me. I recoil in fear. I try and put my tail down, but . . . where’s my tail? And my ears won’t go down either! How do I show fear and subservience to this big scary dog . . . er, man? Instead, I slump my shoulders and lower my head. That should work. Afraid, I lift my eyes to see if it’s working.
“I’m sorry, King Reginald,” some man on my side of the table says, who is also wearing a comfy-looking blanket, though in a color I’ve never seen before, so how weird is that, “but it seems my daughter has come down with the Parchesian Flu. Perhaps if we—”
“Parchesian Flu? The Parchesian Flu doesn’t cause one to eat like a beast!” the man in blue says loudly. “Son! This girl is not for you. The gods would banish you. Let us be gone!”
“But, Father, she’s very pretty. And the last girl you wanted me to marry was an exile from the Tarantulabi. She had such hairy legs. I’m willing—” another, younger, man in blue says.
“No, son. No matter how pretty, there is something wrong. Just look at her posture!” the older man interrupts. Hearing this, I immediately stop slumping my shoulders. But what is going on?
I’m now a human? Am I pretty? Humans would always tell me I was pretty before, so this makes sense. They would all stop and rub me. Perhaps I should let them rub me and everyone would be happy and not angry. I don’t like angry. But I have no tail or movable ears. I’ll just show my belly.
Falling to the floor, I lie on my back. It stings a little, as I’m not as limber as I used to be. This body is so . . . it just doesn’t move as well. But I’m on my back anyway. Instinctively, I wag my nonexistent tail, but it’s just my legs moving? My body is not responding to any of my commands! Ah! Where is my tail?
“Now what is she doing?” the old blue man explodes.
“I don’t know! I’m trying to wag my tail!” I cry. “Where’s my tail?”
“Trixie! What has gotten into you?” roars the man in the new color on my side of the table.
Wait . . . it just occurred to me. How do I understand their language? I used to listen only for “goodgirl” because that was my favorite word. Goodgirl meant rubs and food and smiles. Now I understand these other words; was I speaking them the whole time?
“You can understand me? Am I a goodgirl?” I ask.
“I’m sorry, King Reginald! I assure you, she was fine moments ago. You even saw her. This must be a serious case of that flu. Can we please postpone this initial meeting and try again before the wedding? I promise you, my Princess Trixie has very much been looking forward to meeting your son, Prince Weibold, her future husband. ‘’Tis a match by the gods,’ your prophets say.”
Wait a second. I’m Trixie? My name is Twinkie, not Trixie! Am I not Twinkie anymore? And I’m supposed to marry Prince Weibold? Who even is he? What is marriage? Like Mama and Dada? Ewww!
Now I’m feeling hot from nervousness and from moving my legs a lot. I try panting through my mouth, which usually works. But it’s not working now. I try even harder. “Hah, hah, hah.” No luck. “This mouth’s no good.” Is my snout broken? Maybe I should take these stupid human clothes off? Human clothes are the worst. I try disrobing. This big stupid blanket of a shirt is off, though there is another smaller shirt underneath it! Who does that? Gggrrr. I’ll just try these bottom clothes then. Oh, they look so puffy—maybe I’ll lay on them after and take a nap. Good idea!
“Medics! Medics!” the man in the new color is shouting at the door. “My daughter is clearly burning up with a fever.”
“Fine. It appears we will have to postpone this . . . whatever this is. My personnel will contact you. Come on, Weibold,” the old blue man says as he gets up from the table.
“Hah, hah,” I say. “Why won’t this snout work?”
On their way out, Prince Weibold comes over to me. He peers into my eyes.
“Son! Don’t go near her. She’s partially disrobed! The Goddess of Chastity will smite you down! And she has a flu!” King Reginald exclaims.
“But, Father,” the prince says. He has a hand out, and it’s coming toward me. Is he going to rub my belly? Please please please please please! After everything, I just want someone to rub my belly. I want to go home. I miss Mama and Dada. And Charlotte and Carolina, my human littermates. “Rub the belly!” Giving up on getting this complicated bottom clothes/blanket thing off, I point at my bare stomach.
Instead, the prince’s hand goes to my forehead. “Hmm . . . I don’t feel a fever. I do hope you are okay, though.”
“Nonsense,” the man in the new color says. “My daughter is clearly sick.”
“Then I shall give her my mother’s Yagweez crystal, which is said to activate the healing powers of the gods,” Prince Weibold says, though I’m not sure I understand all the words. He digs in his pocket, pulls out a shiny palm-size yellow ball, and presses it into my hand. “Take this and pray to Yagweezibell, the God of Healing and Vitality.” What? It looks like a tennis ball! And I can’t resist the urge . . .
I pop the ball into my mouth and smile. This boy gave me a present. I am a goodgirl!
“That’s not how you use it, Princess,” the prince says in shock.
“Son! Get your mother’s crystal back now,” King Reginald orders Prince Weibold.
He brings a hand closer to my mouth, but there is no way he is getting my ball! I bare my teeth and growl. Now I’m on all fours, though I can’t figure out these back paws. They don’t seem like paws . . . there are paws attached to these paws? No, that’s not right. These can’t be paws . . . the word comes to me—knees! Human knees!
“Father?” he asks.
“We will reschedule, and my daughter will return the crystal then,” the other man in the new color says. “It is clear these two have a fondness for each other already. Isn’t that right, my daughter?” Is he my father? Whatever. He wants me to give my ball back! Gggrrr!
“You mean she’s going to keep one of our most cherished religious artifacts passed down within the royal family since we first settled on Thorpia and vanquished the Great Bargoosian Swamp Moths to claim the land as our own? It better be returned,” King Reginald says. But, again, I have no idea what he means. “Until then.”
The ten people from the other side of the table all leave the room. I’m left with ten people all in this new color. What should I call it?
“Dada, what color is that?” I ask him, spitting the yellow ball into my hand now that I’ve won it fair and square.
“What the stars are you doing?” he demands unkindly.
“Dada?” I ask.
“I knew you didn’t want to marry Prince Weibold, but I didn’t know you would stoop so low! Literally! Stand up!” I rise off the floor, and I’m standing on back paws. How do humans balance like this? I’m tilting left, tilting right. This is impossible! I stagger over to a chair and lay a free front paw on it. Or hand. “Stop moving! You stole his mother’s crystal! Give it here.”
“Gggrrr!”
“Argh, fine. Keep the stupid thing.” He points to the chair. I sit down, which also feels weird. How will I ever balance with only my back paws on the ground? My front paws hold on tight to the sides of the chair, making sure not to drop my new ball. “Guard, bring her that blouse. And close your eyes!”
A guard brings back the shirt I took off, waving it in front of me because his eyes are closed. Dada is staring at me. I still feel hot, but I think he wants me to put it on. So I try. It was easier to rip it off my chest. But all I can do now is stick my arms through. I can’t make sense of these buttons, though. They must be broken. And how do I even know what buttons are? I never considered them before.
“Do you think I’m going to let you get out of this marriage just because you faked some illness! The Kalaxian Star Empire needs this alliance! I told you that! Our space carriers are being slaughtered by bandits out there, and the Thorpian Stardom is powerful, with a real navy! And they offered a hundred thousand slaves for our factories! In a one-two punch, we can protect our shipping lanes through currently unguarded space and lower our costs in the middle of this labor shortage, and all we have to do is incorporate some of their gods into our official laws and pay their royal family a divinity fee. And you need to give them babies! We need them, and they know it!
“Do you want to see Kalaxian tradesmen die throughout the star empire? You want their blood on your hands? Should I have let you live out the rest of your life in poverty? I saved you and made you royalty!”
“Woof?” I ask.
“Argh!” my new dada says. “Guards! Throw her in the brig!” Five of the men in this new color come to grab me.
Now I’m in trouble. So I do like I do at the dog run when somedog . . . someone tries to take my toy. I bare my teeth and growl. It worked last time with these humans.
“Uh, Emperor Papo? Are you sure she’s not sick?” asks one of the guards, who looks like he’s going to lunge at me but is holding himself back.
“Sick? She’s clearly faking—trying to get out of the marriage! There’s no such thing as the Parchesian Flu. I made it up to save face. Just get her out of my sight! We’ll drug her at the next meeting so that she doesn’t pull a stunt like this again. In two weeks’ time, she’ll be the Thorpians’ problem anyway!” He sweeps his hand through the air.
The guards grab me, and I relent to being carried out of the room like a little puppy. They don’t try for my new ball. To be honest, this actually feels nice. I missed human hands holding me. And I have a new ball! Feeling more like myself, I rub my head into the guard’s shoulder.
“Uh, excuse me?” I ask the guard.
“Yes, Princess Trixie? Are you feeling better?”
“I think so. Now that you’re holding me,” I say, making sure not to remind him of the ball. My new ball!
“Uh . . . um . . . ,” the guard stammers as we exit the banquet room.
“What color are you wearing?” I ask now that we’re outside of that sad room. “I’ve never seen it before.”
“Huh?” the guard asks, his brow twisted in a puzzled expression. “This is red. The color of the Kalaxian flag, clearly. Are you sure you’re not sick? I know Emperor Papo said—”
“Red. Hmm. I think I may be sick. I don’t know who or where I am. And what was that talk about stars and space? I think I know those words, but they don’t make sense to me.” Some things are starting to slowly seep into me. But sometimes it still feels like it’s in a faraway place of my brain. How do I even know what a brain is? Mama and Dada would be so proud. But they’re not here. I’m on my own. Somewhere else. That I know. “How did I get here?”
“You must really be sick,” the guard says as he looks down at me. “Hector,” he says to a guard in front of him. “Alert MedBay that we’re bringing the princess in. I don’t think she’s faking.”
“But, sir, the emperor,” Hector replies, turning to face to us.
“And if she dies?” the guard asks. Hector nods. Wait, who said anything about dying?
As we continue walking down the hall, the guard holding me turns to another guard to his left. “Walter, fetch her lady-in-waiting and have her meet us there.”
“Yes, Captain Gregor,” Walter says.
Before I can ask about dying, Hector, the one in front, picks up a cell phone-looking device, which I now know is the name of the thing Mama would hold and caress instead of me, brings it to his mouth, and speaks into it. The other man scampers out. Oh, I once knew a Scampers. I understand his name now. Yes, he definitely did like to scamper. This human brain is amazing. The things I can understand!
“Your father may say you’re not sick, but if you really are and you die on me, then it’ll be my life, and Lady Marmalade’s, no matter what,” the guard holding me says. He must be Captain Gregor.
“I’m going to die? Please, no,” I cry.
“Not if I can help it,” Captain Gregor replies.
“Oh, thank you. I feel very strange. But the stars? What are they? Where am I?”
“Gee-whizzin’ orbits, Princess. Space? The stars? We’re on a space carriage. Just look outside,” Captain Gregor says. He walks us over to a window.
“Holy cheeseballs!” I exclaim involuntarily. “Where is the grass?”
My eyes instantly close. As I lose consciousness, my grip tightens on my new ball and Captain Gregor calls loudly, “MedBay!”
Our lives are about to change. Trixie already went through a huge transformation, leaving Expiry to live on Limo One and train to be a princess. And I had my change, from a four-legged furry friend to living on a space carriage. But this is their big change.
David Horn has produced a very fun and quirky story here, with some excellent messages and plot twists at the end I genuinely was not expecting. Even the Chapter titles were relevant and oftentimes amusing. I commend Horn on his efforts with this!
It is creative to have the idea of a dog turning into a human and trying (but failing many times in hilarious ways) to behave like one. From the desire to wag her now non-existent tail when she is happy, to licking her friends to comfort them, to spinning around when she is excited, Horn captures all the beloved traits of a dog and conveys Trixie’s struggle to adapt from this.
Indeed, Horn is very attentive to details, especially regarding dogs. The best thing that I’d like to mention is the colour red which Trixie is interested in throughout. For those who are not aware, dogs cannot see the colour red, therefore this is a big thing for Trixie and she discovers that red is a versatile colour as it has many different connotations (embarrassment, anger, blood). Something else that amused me is in the first Chapter, Trixie (well Twinkie, as she would have been then) is chasing after squirrels but refers to them as “Squiwel!” which I believe is due to the funny voices that owners tend to do when talking to and fussing over their dog.
Even the designs are genius, like the chapter header images of the pawprints for Chapter 1 which change into handprints essentially from Chapter 2 onwards, reflective of her transformation from dog to human. A few chapters have a pawprint on the left and a handprint on the right, perhaps to show a conflicting state of mind, or the fact that her friends know her secret by this point. The Epilogue is from the point of view of Justyna which has a pallet and paintbrush as the chapter header image which is very fitting as art is what she is exceptionally talented at. The cover is also very gorgeous and very clearly presents what the story is about without even looking at the blurb.
Trixie is a sweetheart, I love how much she makes a difference with her friends, bringing them out of their shells and giving them a chance to shine. She is also very forgiving which is a lovely quality.
Willow is particularly a very touching character: she is a computer but once Trixie gives her a name, she immediately is able to take on a personality and have thoughts and feelings.
“A name is very important!” I know this from when I was Twinkie and I would listen out for my name all the time. It usually meant food, love, and rubbies... They deserve names too.
True to what Trixie says, names are so important as they are your identity that without it, as shown through Willow you lose all individuality and sense of self and purpose. A rather moving message! There is also a debate throughout the book about whether AI is a help or hindrance, a very relevant subject today.
There are so many humorous moments that genuinely had me laughing out loud! My all-time favourite has to be the practice dinner at breakfast where they are all roleplaying and it goes horribly wrong. And the times when characters, mostly Trixie and Justyna misinterpret what has been said, for example:
“He’s very pious. Maybe that counts for something.” I do like pie.
I like that every character Trixie encounters she compares to dogs: Lady Marmalade she mistakes for her dog best friend Bailey who is a nova scotia duck tolling retriever. Koko seems like a large fierce rottweiler. Brandi reminds her of a chow. Perri is considered as a papillon. Lady Justyna is akin to a golden retriever. Willow’s name is picked from Trixie’s association with a goldendoodle “who thought she knew everything, just like the computer”. Dr. Lam’s hair is compared to a poodle. Voltari is compared to a pit bull, rather fitting symbolically as they are often considered dangerous. This helped me greatly to visualise what each character was like.
I loved the Taylor Swift references too; they made me grin! Tayson Kwik is of course a pun on the name Taylor Swift, Kwikie for Swifties, Empires Tour instead of Eras tour, with some merchandise that says 13989 reminiscent of 1989 and “Amor” as a heads up to “Lover”. I think a lot of young adults will enjoy and appreciate this.
A few negatives:
I did not realise this would be part of a series so I expected a conclusion though realised by the 2nd last chapter this would not be the case. I am a little disappointed but it will be interesting to see where this story goes. Hopefully, we will get the chance to see Dr. Lam again.
I think that, though mentioned frequently, KAMP (Kalaxian Association of Medical Practitioners) and its motives should have been explained more thoroughly early on as this was unclear until Chapter 4, and I was not sure why they couldn’t be trusted. I suggest around the time in Chapter 3 when Trixie finds out what KAMP stands for.
The betrayals felt too repetitive for my liking, or rather *who* was betraying them.