Five Hundred Kingdoms (5)

The Sleeping Beauty is the sixth book in the Five Hundred Kingdoms series. A mixture of Little Red Riding Hood and Beauty and the Beast, the story follows Isabella (Bella) Beauchamps who lives with her father, stepmother and two stepsisters. It is currently scheduled for release in October 2011.

Godmother Lily is having a hard time protecting the small but rich kingdom of Eltaria. The Tradition is trying to force Princess Rosamund down a path -- but is it that of Sleeping Beauty or Snow White? Everything seems to be being subverted, from the seven evil dwarfs who capture Rosamund, to the Wicked Stepmother who rescues her. And to top it all, Prince Siegfried needs to rescue a maiden who isn't his aunt from a ring of fire in order to avoid his own Doom. The only solution to all this: issue a set of challenges to all the local Princes, the prize being the kingdom and fair Rosamund's hand.

Godmother and Snow Queen, Aleksia's main job is to support the Tradition by abducting young men about to turn bad, and putting them through a trial to show them the error of their ways. She sometimes worries that she is becoming as cold as her own Ice Palace. But then come the rumours of a wicked Snow Witch, freezing whole villages to death, and claiming to be the Snow Queen. Aleksia has to set off on her own adventure to sort things out.

In the Five Hundred Kingdoms, the Tradition is always hard at work, trying to make everyone's life fit a fairy tale. But there are only so many Sleeping Princesses, or Noble Princes, to go around. So Elena Klovis, ground down by her wicked stepmother and two cruel sisters, awaits her prince. But he's only 11, and so completely unsuitable. But eventually, her Fairy Godmother turns up to help, in a rather unexpected way.

In an isolated land wher the lure of the "Moontide" leads to shipwrecks, a woman is torn between obeying her father or her king. When she chooses to follow a Fool, she discovers magic she'd never expected... at a price that might be too high....