iStory Anna, the Princess Rose Review

iStory Anna, the Princess Rose is a lovely story book for iPad with some nice interactions included. One can choose to listen to narration or read this book to oneself and auto-play is included, always a nice option for the very young.

This sweet story is about Princess Anna, who cares for all roses around her and does all that she can to make a rose bush bloom after it has trouble opening its buds. This story book is very bright and colorful with lovely hand-drawn illustrations and a beautiful use of watercolors. It is lovely that one can add stickers to the pages, each with its own sound effect.

The stickers, like the illustrations themselves, are very pretty and my son enjoys adding them to each of the pages. They include many roses to choose from, lovely humming birds, darling butterflies and many choices as well. Objects to adorn the princess also exist including tiaras and purses, but I wish her feet were available in order for her to wear her shoes, It is nice that the objects to be worn or held by Anna, like bracelets or lanterns, have cut-outs that one can line up to her wrist or hand so they look as if they are truly being worn or held, this also working the reader's fine motor skills in order to line things up correctly.

I like that these stickers are not just for beautification, but some mini games are included where the player adds a missing object that is a focal point from the story's page, found among the stickers, such as a wide-brimmed hat to shield the flowers from the sun, or a light source to inspect the buds at night. It is nice that there is no wrong answer for these mini games, and the reader is given a few correct answers that can be mixed and matched to discover which one is preferred, something I also found myself doing as we read the story book.

I was confused, however, when one page makes note of Anna needing an umbrella to prevent the roses from being drenched, the handle of the umbrella being visible, but there are no umbrella choices among the stickers - something that I hope can be worked out in a future update.

This app is a lot of fun, and the use of the stickers makes it a story that children will want to go back to and visit again and again. This is a tale that my son asks for, calling it “the one about the girl who is really into flowers,” and I enjoy it too. I especially like the look of the cloudy skies that may mix medias a bit with the illustrations, adding what looks like beautiful cloud photography to a page in the story which I found quite striking.