The Birthday Ball Author:Lois Lowry, Jules Feiffer (Illustrator) Princess Patricia Priscilla's sixteenth birthday is in one week. That means she has seven days before her birthday ball, and seven days before the moment when she must select a suitor to marry. Oh, dear. Seven days is not a very long time, sixteen is not very old, and Princess Patricia Priscilla's prospective suit... more »ors consist of a dirty duke, a foppish prince, and foul-mouthed conjoined counts. Princess Patricia Pricilla is not terribly optimistic about the whole affair. And so, with her cat Delicious in tow, Princess Pat sneaks off to join the peasant children each day at the schoolhouse in hopes of finding out just what she's been missing before she must resign herself to a wretched future. But after meeting Fred, Nell, Liz the norphan, and a rather dreamy schoolmaster, Princess Pat wonders if perhaps the plans for her Birthday Ball might require one or two adjustments. . .« less