April Michelle Davis and her middle-grade book A Princess in Disguise were featured at the Barnes & Noble, Short Pump Town Center, in Richmond, Virginia, on April 22, 2017. April Michelle was available to greet, sign copies of her book, answer questions about her book and the publishing  process, and introduce her website geared toward princesses and readers of her book.

April Michelle also had available for all those who stopped by her table coloring sheets that she designed using the illustrations and quotes from her book. You can get your copy of A Princess in Disguise autographed by April Michelle and a set of the coloring pages by requesting both from April Michelle Davis.

 

April Michelle Davis wrote her book A Princess in Disguise because of her fascination with princesses. She wrote this fiction book using descriptions of many 1700 and 1800 places and things.

In August 2017, Geri Walton asked April Michelle to guest blog on the boats of this era because Princess Margaret and Huntley, the main female and male characters of A Princess in Disguise, sailed on a boat during many of their adventures and Princess Margaret’s father, the king, owned a fleet of ships.

The boats built in the 1700s and 1800s traveled slower because they depended on the wind to move them, and their lifespans were shorter than those of today partly because of bug infestation, which helped to weaken the wood of the hauls. The wheel to steer the boat was an important component because it determined the direction the boat would move, which also meant it would require crewmen to man it at all times, day and night, to keep the boat on course.

The variety of the food on the boats was limited, and some items were in short supply because of lack of funds or food contamination, yet what was available was still consumed by the crewmen and livestock so oftentimes the crewmen became ill and required medical treatment. Yet, medical treatment onboard the boats was simple and ports could be miles in the distance. The lifestyle of the crewmen on the boats was not very desirable, and the wages they earned were minimal compared to the hard labor that was performed to earn them.

April Michelle Davis’s young adult book A Princess in Disguise was reviewed by Kathleen Lance of One Stop Fiction. And this review led to A Princess in Disguisereceiving an award: The One Stop Fiction Book Award!

Lance’s interpretations were very similar to April Michelle’s, just expressed in different words, such as how Lance described the relationship between Princess Margaret and the emotion love.

Lance wrote, “Readers will appreciate [Margaret’s] courage in abandoning an arranged marriage to seek love. At first this is the love of her mother who disappeared when Margaret was just a baby. But, as Margaret comes to discover, love can include love for one’s country and people, love for a man, and love for the woman who, though not her mother, was always there for her. This important lesson if given through Margaret’s adventures on Huntley’s ship and through her increasing awareness of the world around her. Ms. Davis has given readers a lesson without actually teaching.”

Lance truly understands April Michelle’s special messages that are intertwined in the pages of her book A Princess in Disguise. Through growth and maturity, Margaret experiences the many facets of love and comes to rely on this as an inner strength to make her final destiny decision that will drive her forward.

April Michelle Davis was selected as the local author from the northern Virginia area to have a portion of her young adult book A Princess in Disguise read to an audience of elementary school age children and their parents. The event, Reading ROCKS the Red Carpet, hosted by the faculty of Marshall Elementary School, was held at the Barnes & Noble in Manassas, Virginia, on September 15, 2017.

Local celebrities were invited to read stories to the children, and April Michelle was the featured local author. April Michelle grew up in Fairfax County, attending school, elementary through college, before April Michelle married her prince and moved to the Richmond area.

In April Michelle‘s book A Princess in Disguise, the main female character, Princess Margaret, journeyed throughout her father’s and uncle’s lands, living among their people, only to rediscover that to be true to herself she must be true to the people she would someday rule over.

April Michelle Davis and A Princess in Disguise were highlighted for NEA’s Read Across America in The Bridge, Messiah College Alumni Magazine. “April Michelle is a ’01 English graduate who relies on the education she received at Messiah College in her profession as an author when writing her recently published young adult book A Princess in Disguise.”