Most Recommended Books

Track reading, wishlists & new-book alerts

Get
Skip to content
Share:

Anna Staniszewski Books in Order

Explore Anna Staniszewski books in order, with series guides, short summaries, and simple tips on where to start for middle grade readers.

Last updated: July 7, 2026

As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases (at no extra cost to you).

View

Publication Order

Sort:

22 books

My Very UnFairy Tale Life

by Anna Staniszewski

2011

Jenny is tired of being an official adventurer and wants a normal life for once. Then Prince Charming needs help, and she is pulled back into a world of monsters, magical kingdoms, and very inconvenient heroics.

My Epic Fairy Tale Fail

by Anna Staniszewski

2013

Jenny heads to the Land of Tales with her two best friends, hoping to break an evil witch's grip and learn what happened to her parents. To do it, she must survive three impossible tasks and her first real failure.

My Sort of Fairy Tale Ending

by Anna Staniszewski

2013

Jenny's biggest quest yet takes her into Fairy Land to stop the Queen Fairy and search for her missing parents. The finale keeps the jokes coming, but the stakes are much higher as magic itself starts slipping away.

The Dirt Diary

by Anna Staniszewski

2014

Rachel secretly took money from her college fund and now has to earn it back by cleaning houses with her mom. The job is humiliating, but getting close to the most popular kids in school gives her access to secrets she may regret using.

The Prank List

by Anna Staniszewski

2014

When a rival cleaning company threatens her mom's business, Rachel launches a prank-filled plan to fight back. Saving the family may be harder than she thought, especially when every scheme seems ready to explode in her face.

I'm with Cupid

by Anna Staniszewski

2015

Lena is a soul collector. Marcus is a cupid. After a dare leads to a kiss, their powers swap, and suddenly both middle school and the supernatural world get a lot more complicated.

Power Down, Little Robot

by Anna Staniszewski

2015

Little Robot will try every bedtime trick in the book, from extra oil to last-minute worries, if it means staying awake a bit longer. Mom Unit knows the routine, and the result is a playful robot twist on a familiar nightly battle.

The Gossip File

by Anna Staniszewski

2015

While visiting her dad at a Florida resort, Rachel reinvents herself as confident Ava to impress the older girls at the cafe. But joining their gossip file means risking real friendships, real feelings, and one secret too many.

Finders Reapers

by Anna Staniszewski

2016

Lena and Marcus have their powers back, but dating does not make life easier when love and death are still tangled together. A too-powerful match and a missing soul send them into another funny, high-stakes supernatural mess.

Once Upon a Cruise

by Anna Staniszewski

2016

Ainsley expects a boring summer stuck helping on her mom's fairy tale cruise, not shipboard disasters and a crush on the boy in the Pig King costume. As problems pile up, she has to stop keeping quiet and start speaking up.

The Truth Game

by Anna Staniszewski

2016

Rachel hopes ninth grade will feel like a fresh start, but an anonymous app for sharing secrets only makes things worse. When her private confessions stop staying private, her friendship with Marisol is suddenly on the line.

Dogosaurus Rex

by Anna Staniszewski

2017

Ben wants the best dog in the world and comes home with Sadie, who just happens to be enormous, green, and more dinosaur than puppy. She causes chaos everywhere, but Ben knows she still deserves a real chance.

Match Me If You Can

by Anna Staniszewski

2017

Lena is ready for a quiet break, until both her reaper powers and Marcus's cupid powers vanish and start turning up elsewhere. To stop love and death from spinning out of control, they have to work together again.

Secondhand Wishes

by Anna Staniszewski

2019

Lexi finds a bag of wishing stones just when friendship troubles and family worries are piling up. The wishes work, sort of, but their strange side effects teach her that magic cannot neatly fix fear, jealousy, or love.

The Magic Mirror

by Anna Staniszewski

2019

A broken magic mirror has left the Enchanted Kingdom stuck in a miserable heat wave. Kara and Zed set out to find the missing piece and uncover who shattered it before summer becomes permanent.

The Stolen Slipper

by Anna Staniszewski

2019

When Prince Patrick loses both the mysterious girl from the ball and the glass slipper that could find her again, Kara and Zed take the case. Their search leads to palace secrets, danger, and a race to save a happily ever after.

The Missing Dwarf

by Anna Staniszewski

2020

Snow White is about to be married, but one of her dwarfs has been kidnapped by the Evil Queen. Kara and Zed race to the castle to solve the mystery before the wedding, and the kingdom, falls apart.

The Snoring Princess

by Anna Staniszewski

2020

Princess Rosa's palace is under a sleeping spell that is set to end tonight. But when the princess goes missing, Kara and Zed must find her before sunset starts the whole spell all over again.

The Wonder of Wildflowers

by Anna Staniszewski

2020

Ten-year-old Mira hopes finally becoming a citizen will help her fit in with her magical classmates. But as fear spreads across Amberland, she has to rethink what belonging, power, and home really mean.

Beast in Show

by Anna Staniszewski

2021

Julia is sure her dog Huxley belongs in the winner's circle, until a very unusual dog show reveals some wildly fierce competition. Funny and sweet, the story becomes less about trophies and more about kindness, loyalty, and losing well.

Clique Here

by Anna Staniszewski

2021

Science-loving Lily sees a new school as the perfect chance to reinvent herself as popular Blake. But once her social experiment gets messy and old friendships collide with new ones, she has to decide whether fitting in is worth losing herself.

Double Clique

by Anna Staniszewski

2021

LB wants to fix things with her best friend, Kat, after the disaster of her popularity experiment. A returned bully and a brand new friendship formula push her into awkward territory as she learns that growing up can change even the closest bonds.

Where should I start?

If you want funny fairy tale chaos: My Very UnFairy Tale LifeMy Epic Fairy Tale FailMy Sort of Fairy Tale Ending
If you like realistic middle school drama: The Dirt DiaryThe Prank ListThe Gossip FileThe Truth Game
If you want younger mystery-fantasy: The Magic MirrorThe Stolen SlipperThe Missing DwarfThe Snoring Princess
If you want friendship stories with humor: Clique HereDouble Clique
If you want standalones with a little magic: Secondhand WishesOnce Upon a CruiseThe Wonder of Wildflowers

Author bio

Anna Staniszewski was born in Warsaw, Poland, and grew up in Westborough, Massachusetts. She has said she loved stories in both Polish and English from an early age, and that bilingual reading life seems to have stayed with her. Her books often have one foot in the ordinary world and one foot somewhere stranger, funnier, or more magical.

As a kid, she spent hours writing poems and stories on an old Polish typewriter. She has joked that those poems were awful. Still, the habit stuck, and so did the feeling that making stories was worth the effort.

After high school she went to Sarah Lawrence College, where she earned a BFA in Theater. At that point, writing was only one of several futures she could imagine for herself. She has also talked about wanting to teach, act, and even become a ballerina, which feels very on brand for an author whose characters are always trying to sort out who they might become.

Then books pulled her back.

Working at the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst put her in the middle of people who cared deeply about children's literature. That experience rekindled her interest in writing for young readers, and she later moved to Boston to study at Simmons University, where she earned both an MA in Children's Literature and an MFA in Writing for Children.

In 2006 she was the Writer-in-Residence at the Boston Public Library. A few years later, her manuscript The Tinkerers won the Susan P. Bloom Discovery Award. In 2011, her first published novel, My Very UnFairy Tale Life, introduced readers to Jenny the Adventurer, a girl who saves magical kingdoms while wishing she could just be normal for once.

That book set the tone for a lot of what followed. Staniszewski likes funny narrators, magical complications, and kids who are more capable than they sometimes realize. Readers who enjoy brisk fantasy often start with My Very UnFairy Tale Life or the younger Once Upon a Fairy Tale chapter books, while readers who want school stories with heart often gravitate toward The Dirt Diary, Clique Here, and Double Clique.

She also writes strong standalones. Secondhand Wishes uses magical wishing stones to explore friendship and fear. Once Upon a Cruise turns a fairy tale themed summer job into a story about family, crushes, and speaking up. In The Wonder of Wildflowers, she blends fantasy with questions about belonging, citizenship, and home. Even her picture books, like Dogosaurus Rex, Beast in Show, and Power Down, Little Robot, carry that same mix of silliness and feeling.

Kids in her books are allowed to be worried, funny, and a little messy.

These days she lives south of Boston with her family, writes at a tiny desk instead of that old typewriter, and teaches courses on writing and children's literature. It suits her work. Her stories are imaginative, but they are also grounded in the everyday business of growing up.

Edited by

Richard Reis

Software engineer whose passion for tracking book recommendations from podcasts inspired the creation of MRB.

Anurag Ramdasan

Lead investor at 3one4 Capital whose startup expertise and love for books helped shaped MRB and its growth.

Comments

Did we miss something? Have feedback?

Help us improve this page by sharing your thoughts

We only use your email to notify you about replies.

All comments are moderated.

Discover and track your reading on the go

Track your reading, manage wishlists, and get notified when new books are added.