A World Without Princes (The School for Good and Evil, #2)
by  Soman Chainani (Goodreads Author), Iacopo Bruno (Illustrator)

3 out of 5 stars

Sophie and Agatha are back at the School for Good and Evil, except now the schools are divided between boys and girls. The girls want to make the boys their slaves, and the boys want to kill Sophie because they blame her for all the changes in the fairy tale world. Agatha wished that she could have Tedros as her prince, and Sophie will do anything to keep them apart. Sophie tries so hard to be good, but will her witchy evil side come out despite Agatha’s friendship?

I liked this second book in the series okay. I feel like a lot of the plot conflict could have been avoided if they would just talk to each other. It’s that misunderstanding trope that gets on my nerves. But there were also some villains pulling strings in the background to assist the misunderstandings, so it’s not entirely due to the stupidity of our main characters.

There are a lot of LGBTQ undertones in this book, including a gnome that can change genders whenever they want. Lots of people go in disguise into the boys or girls schools, masquerading as the other gender, but there is no mention that they are actually transgender or gay. There is also a scene where Tedros kisses a girl who is disguised as a boy, so it seems like he is kissing another boy, although it’s really a girl.

I really liked all the mysteries surrounding the magical world, and Agatha goes searching for clues to understand the roles of different players in her fairy tale, especially the enigmatic headmistress of the girls school.

I partly read this book with my eyes and partly listened to the audiobook narrated by Polly Lee. The narration was okay, but not great.

This book has been screened for some mild violence and dark magic content on the Screen It First website. https://screenitfirst.com/book/a-world-without-princes-the-school-for-good-and-evil-2-748059