Tag Archives: Fairy Tales

A Review of The Girls in Red

Book cover for The Girls in Red by BB Wrenne. There is no image on the cover. It’s simply bright red with the title written in a wavy yellow font and the author’s name in a smaller black font. Title: The Girls in Red

Author: BB Wrenne

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: October 3, 2021

Genres: Fantasy, LGBTQ+, Historical

Length: 21 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

Two girls enter the woods on a journey to visit their fiances – a short story, also available as part of the collection Fabulas Part 2

Review:

Content Warning: Arranged marriages, an animal attack, and a small amount of blood.

Danger lurks everywhere in the forest.

While astute readers may have already guessed which famous fairy tale this was based on, I’m going to do my best not to give too many clues about it for anyone who prefers to be pleasantly surprised. I honestly haven’t seen this chosen for many retellings over the years, so I was excited to see how the author would reimagine what was a rather straightforward and short tale in its original form. Despite the many changes over the centuries, errands are still part of everyday life today. This includes trips to see places or visit people you might really rather not be visiting, and that mild but persistent sense of dread is as relevant now as it was many generations ago.

The ending was what lead me to choosing a three star review. After a fast-paced and atmospheric beginning and middle to this story, it suddenly ended without resolving the main conflict. There was so much more the author could have done with this, especially given the source material and how common it is for women who didn’t conform to the cultural expectations of women in the past or of this genre as a whole to still find places to thrive in the centuries and the forests in which they happen to live. If the final scene had been developed more thoroughly, I would have happily gone for a full five-star rating as I was thrilled with what I was reading up until that point.

I adored the romantic subplot. Yes, it moved forward rapidly, but the author was careful to explain why Ru and Thalia, who had known each other a very long time, were only now beginning to realize the depth of their feelings for each other. Given the era in which they lived, it made perfect sense for them to take as long as they did to talk about their feelings, much less entertain even the slightest notions of pursuing them. Slow-burn romances make perfect sense in circumstances such as these.

The Girls in Red was a thoughtful twist on a famous fairy tale.

 

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Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge: Favourite Fairy Tale or Legend and Why

Hosted by Long and Short Reviews.

Click here to read everyone else’s replies to this week’s question and to read everyone else’s replies to this week’s question and here to see the full list of topics for the year.

An iron sign that has the name Wool Pit carved out of iron in it. The sign also has a carving of two children, a church, and a wolf on it. The rest of the sign is comprised of thin rods that are needed to hold everything together. You can see a great deal of the grey sky and the empty tree branches through it. My favourite sorts of fairy tales or legends are the ones based on true stories.

For example, I am endlessly fascinated by The Green Children of Woolpit.

It was harvest time during the reign of King Steven (so somewhere between 1135 and 1154). A boy and a girl who had green skin, spoke a strange tongue, and were wearing odd clothing appeared in the village of Woolpit.

They were taken to the home of Richard de Calne and refused to eat anything until someone finally offered them broad beans a few days later. That was the only food they ate for a time, although they gradually adapted to the typical diet of people living in the U.K. in the 1100s. Their skin slowly lost its green hue during this adjustment period as well.

One version of the story says the boy died soon after he was baptized. In another version, both children lived and began sharing stories of their previous life once they learned to speak the language of their rescuers.

The girl (or the children) said they came from St Martin’s Land where everything was green, the sun never shone, and the sky always looked like twilight. She or they said they’d found their way to Woolpit while they were out herding their father’s cattle and heard a loud noise.

Her rescuers named the girl Agnes, and she was a servant in Richard de Calne‘s home for many years before she married someone named Richard Barre.

Did these kids come from a magical alternate reality? Or had they simply gotten lost in the forest and wandered in from a village that was just far enough away from Woolpit that the folks there didn’t recognize their language or clothing?

Travelling was much harder back then, after all, and the local cultures, languages, and customs could change dramatically from place to place.

As for their green skin, was it a mistranslated description of children who might have had complexions that were a little darker or lighter than expected? Were they aliens from another planet? Did they have chlorosis (iron-deficiency anemia) which can cause a green hue to the skin but disappears once you have a better diet? Or maybe they had a case of mild arsenic poisoning that killed the boy but that little Agnes survived?

Some people think this tale is much, much older than the 1100s. Maybe the children are an allusion to the first human inhabitants of Europe who were all but completely replaced by new waves of immigrants to that continent between 5,000 and 9,000 years ago.

Something can evolve a lot over the generations while still retaining a kernel of truth about the people or places featured in it, after all. There is an aboriginal tribe in Australia who has a legend about a violent meteor strike that scientists recently confirmed really did happen 4,700 years ago.

So I think it’s plausible that some of the other “myths” people like to share could be just as old as that one even if certain details might have changed over the years depending on how rigorously a culture trains their storytellers on getting every word right.

The possibilities are endless. You can chalk everything up to purely logical explanations or choose much more fanciful ones if you prefer. Either way, I think this is an excellent story and I wish we knew more about what happened to Agnes after she got married and where she really came from.

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Summer Lessons: A Review of Modern Parables

Book cover for Modern Parables by Alex Sonifrank and Richa Sonifrank. Image on cover is a painting of a red truck sitting in a meadow on a partially cloudy spring day. A white boy is sitting in the passenger seat of the vehicle, and an Indian girl and a pig are sitting in the bed of the truck in the back. There is also a white goat sitting on top of the trunk and a large red bird flying overhead. All of the characters look relaxed and happy as they gaze upon the peaceful scene before them. Title: Modern Parables

Author: Alex Sonifrank and Richa Sonifrank

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: July 16, 2022

Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary

Length: 82 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the authors.

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

You may be familiar with the tortoise and the hare, but have you heard of the king and the sage?

A collection of short stories about the challenges we face each day in the modern world.

Stories that would take you all around the world to different cultures, times, and places. From ancient kings to modern mayors, from vast farmlands and forests to present day offices and from sages to priests.

Review:

Story time is for everyone.

Improving one’s character is a complex task that never ends. Some of my favorite stories in this book were the ones that featured people who genuinely thought they were doing the right thing in life. Good intentions don’t always translate to helpful choices, though, and I nodded along as they realized that sometimes you can be too nice, too eager to give others unsolicited advice, or too quick to judge without knowing someone’s history. These are the sorts of lessons that work better when repeated in a lot of different ways in my experience, so I was glad to see so much attention paid to them here.

I had mixed feelings about the fact that the lesson each story was teaching was written after the end of it. Yes, some readers probably need to have such things pointed out directly to them, but I also think that there’s a big benefit to discussing what you’ve just read and allowing the audience to come to their own conclusions about what it all means and how it should apply to our daily lives. Sometimes one can learn more from a conversation about a work than the tale itself, after all! With that being said, I’ll leave it up to other readers to come to their own conclusions about how well this worked. Just because it didn’t resonate with me doesn’t meant that everyone else will necessarily feel the same way!

One of the strengths of this collection was how varied it was. The characters in it came from a wide array of ages, backgrounds, and places. That isn’t necessarily something that’s common in traditional parables or fairy tales, so it was refreshing to discover here. One specific parable might be more meaningful to a certain person based on their previous experiences in life, but there were so many different types of them that I think anyone will be able to find something that appeals to them. I appreciate authors who pay attention to such things and try to reach out to all sorts of different people in our modern age.

Modern Parables was a thought-provoking read.

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Dreaming of Happily Ever After: A Review of Somewhere in Time

Somewhere in Time by Fizza Younis book cover. Image on cover shows a drawing of a sun and stars superimposed on an actual photo of the night sky that has a few hazy clouds (or maybe galaxies?) floating through it. Title: Somewhere in Time

Author: Fizza Younis

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: October 31, 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal, Contemporary, Historical

Length: 34 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

It’s a fairy tale retelling of the classic Sleeping Beauty, set between the twentieth and the twenty-first centuries, the story has a darker paranormal twist, and no happily-ever-after within sight. But what the future holds for our beloved characters, Aurora and Prince Phillip, is yet to be determined.

Review:

Content Warning: mafia, murder, suicide, and a brief mention of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Get ready for a wild ride.

This tale was a delightful mixture of topics I’d never think to include in the same storyline like the mafia, the Covid-19 pandemic, and Sleeping Beauty. I admire authors who are willing to take risks like this with their writing. It makes for an exciting reading experience for those of us who are well-versed in the fantasy genre and who can be difficult to surprise. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for what Ms. Younis writes next, although I won’t try to guess where her vivid and playful imagination might wander.

Fairy tales don’t have to explain everything, of course, but I found myself wishing this one had gone into more details about how the magic works in this world. For example, the reason why Aurora fell into her deep sleep never made sense to me. I could accept the magical veil that protected her and her stately home while she slept, but it sure would have been nice to know why this spell existed in the first place and under what conditions she might wake up. There were so many other changes to the classic Sleeping Beauty story in this retelling that I didn’t think I should make any assumptions about who or what might have caused these magical events. If the author had been clearer about this, I would have happily chosen a higher rating.

The ending made me yearn for more. I wanted to know how Aurora adjusted to the world after her long nap and what she was planning to do with the rest of her life. Given that this was a fairy tale, though, it did make sense to stop at that moment. Princesses have nearly always been traditionally been described as living happily ever after, and I’m hoping the same can be said about heiresses who wake up in the modern world. Who knows? Maybe we’ll someday get a sequel and find out for sure.

Somewhere in Time kept me guessing until the final sentence.

 

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The Healer: A Review of Sweet Basil

Sweet Basil by Lea Doué book cover. Image on cover shows a young woman wearing a black cloak and touching her Hans as she walks through a deserted forest on a slightly foggy day. TitleSweet Basil – A Firethorn Chronicles Short Story

Author: Lea Doué

Publisher: Butterwing Publishing (Self-Published)

Publication Date: August 30, 2021

Genres: Fantasy, Historical

Length: 24 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

Hiding from sorcerer hunters, Marisol travels in search of those she can help with her dangerous gift of healing. With every life she saves comes the risk of being discovered, but only if her secret doesn’t destroy her first.

Sweet Basil is a stand-alone short story set in the world of The Firethorn Chronicles, a series drawn from The Twelve Dancing Princesses and other fairytales.

Review:

Content Warning: Pain and  life-threatening illnesses. I will not mention them in my review.

Would you continue using your powers for good even if doing so put you in terrible danger?

I’d never read a tale about a magical tattoo, and the idea excited me as soon as it was introduced in one of the very first scenes. The person who had that tattoo knew that it was something incredibly special that not everyone around them would understand, so they had to take measures to prevent others from noticing that their tattoo could do things like move around of its own accord. I’m dancing around this subject a little to avoid spoilers, but I was impressed by how creatively the author explained this portion of the plot. It made me think about tattoos in an entirely new light, and I was pleasantly surprised by how much this item affected the course of the storyline.

It would have been helpful to have more world building. No, I didn’t expect the author to explain everything, especially since it was a prequel that was primarily meant to whet the appetites of new readers for more. With that being said, there were a few scenes I found confusing because of how little time was spent explaining what the rules of magic are in this universe and how someone can reasonably expect a magical object to behave when it is used. I simply didn’t know enough about those matters to tell if items like the tattoo were acting out of the ordinary or not.

One of my favorite things about this story was how it depicted Marisol and Renzo’s friendship. Many storytellers, especially in the fantasy genre,  immediately assume that any two characters who are single and who share compatible sexual orientations must end up in a relationship together no matter how much this may or may not make sense for their individual character arcs or for the plot as a whole. Given this trope, it was refreshing to see how the author handled their friendship and where she took it. Her decisions made sense for for what I know thus far about the characters and the plot. Obviously, I can’t say how the rest of the series will develop from here as I haven’t read it yet, but I appreciated what’s been done with it up until this point.

This is a prequel to a series. It can be read as a standalone work.

Sweet Basil – A Firethorn Chronicles Short Story made me smile. 

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Seeking Safe Haven: A Review of The Bruised Princess

The Bruised Princess by A.G. Marshall book cover. Image on cover shows an etching of a castle and a woman wearing a long gown and a veil. She is facing to the right, and the castle is facing forward. Title: The Bruised Princess

Author: A.G. Marshall

Publisher: Avanell Publishing

Publication Date: April 7, 2019

Genres: Fantasy, Historical

Length: 31 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author. If you are not already familiar with The Princess and the Pea, read it for free at this link before reading this short story.

Rating: 4 Stars

Blurb:

A desperate girl on a stormy night…

Rachel is searching for sanctuary from her abusive father, but finds herself a guest in the castle instead. Why does everyone assume she is important, and why do they insist that she sleep on an enormous mattress tower?

Can she unravel the mystery and find a happy ending, or will she be trapped in something even worse? See for yourself in this romantic retelling of The Princess and the Pea.

The Bruised Princess is book three in the Once Upon a Short Story collection.
Discover a unique twist on your favorite fairy tales with these standalone adventures!

Review:

Content Warning: Physical and emotional abuse. I will discuss these topics in my review.

Sensitivity is a gift.

One of my favourite aspects of this short story had to do with how it handled the physical and emotional abuse that two of the characters suffered before and during the time that the readers knew them. These are serious topics that have been covered in a myriad of ways in both the fiction and non-fiction genres for good reason. What made Ms. Marshall’s approach to them unique was how much hope she held for her characters. Yes, they were going through awful experiences at the moment, but that didn’t mean their circumstances were going to remain the same forever. Things can begin to change for the better much faster than one can imagine, and there are so many kind people out there who are willing to help.  These are such important messages to send to survivors, and I think it’s wonderful that the romance genre is yet another place to find it.

I would have liked to see a little more plot development in this piece. Everything happened quickly and without a lot of exposition. That worked well for the beginning and middle, but the ending felt a bit rushed to me because of it. If those last few scenes had been given more time to shine, I would have gone with a full five-star rating. Everything else about this was well done and written to appeal to both new and longtime fans of the romance and fantasy genres.

Rachel was an admirable protagonist. She was physically and emotionally bruised from her father’s mistreatment and the frightening threats of the man he was trying to force her to marry, but she never gave up her desire to find a safe place to live. Her tenacity made me smile, especially when the odds seemed more stacked against her than they ever had been before. I also appreciated the fresh perspective she brought to the traditional legend of The Princess and the Pea. She made certain aspects of it make so much more sense than they had been before.

The Bruised Princess was a heartwarming read.

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Chasing Victory: A Review of The Sea Witch

Title: The Sea Witch

Author: Bethany Hoeflich

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: February 21, 2021

Genres: Fantasy, Historical

Length: 30 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

For years, Ula has been content to hide behind her reputation as the sea queen’s quirky, loner sister.

Isolation and mistrust are her shields, protecting the secrets of her past from resurfacing.

When the sea king offers her the position of court sorcerer, Ula sees an opportunity to reclaim what had been stolen from her.

How could she anticipate it would cost her everything?

The Sea Witch is a villainous short story inspired by The Little Mermaid.

Review:

Content Warning: Blood and death of a parent. I will not be discussing these topics in my review.

Villains come in all shapes and sizes.

I enjoyed seeing how the world building unfolded. There was just enough of it in this tale for me to develop a good sense of what this mermaid society was like and why Ula was so frustrated with her lot in life. The smallest changes in a mermaid’s life could lead to radically different outcomes years later, so it was important to put all of these pieces together during the short time I had with her. If the author ever decides to write a sequel, I’d sure like to take a deeper dive into this society and the unique mermaids who are part of it.

It would have been helpful to have more character development, especially when it concerned Ula. She was such an intelligent and resourceful individual that I found it difficult to understand some of her choices. I could think of so many other ways for her to resolve the conflicts in her life and achieve her goals. It puzzled me to see how often she skipped ahead to more drastic measures when she had so many other options to choose from. I would have liked to get to know her better so that these decisions and her thought processes behind them would make more sense.

Magic was both an art and a science in this universe. It’s effects could generally be predicted in advance, but any mermaid worth his or her fins knew that it was impossible to predict every possible outcome if one ventured down this path. It was amusing to see how Ula had learned to cope with the unpredictable elements of her occupation while also doing everything she could to get the desired results when she cast a spell. The author struck a nice balance between describing how all of this worked and allowing readers to fill in other pieces of puzzle for ourselves.

The Sea Witch was a fun summer read.

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The Day Before Christmas Eve: A Review of The Yule Cat

The Yule Cat - a Christmas Short Story by Eldritch Black book cover. Image on coer shows drawing of a blue cat sitting in the snow outside of a village at night. The cat is staring ahead at the reader. Title: The Yule Cat – a Christmas Short Story

Author: Eldritch Black

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: October 25, 2020

Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, Holidays

Length: 46 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

Strange, scary rumors are flying about the tiny, snowy town below the mountains. Some say a tiger sprang loose from a circus train and roams the snowy meadows. Some say it stalks in the wintry forests. Some say it’s a monster. 

But feisty Maisie Crompton knows that can’t be true. Such things never happen in their sleepy alpine village. 
Or do they?

For soon, Maisie finds herself crossing the path of a spine-chilling legend. The Yule Cat; a fearsome mythical beast collecting snacks for his winter feast. And should Maisie fail in the cat-and-mouse hunt that follows, she might well become the next morsel on his menu…

From the author of Krampus and The Thief of Christmas, The Yule Cat is a short Christmas story brimming with magic, trolls, spooky mythology, and fun and festive chills for readers of all ages

Review:

Be careful what you wish for.

If only I could read that introduction to this review to Maisie! Her envious attitude in the first scene certainly gave me a strong impression of her. I sympathized with her frustration over having to count every last cent so carefully. The holidays are a tough time to be poor, especially for a kid who is watching her best friend show off an expensive new coat. I know the narrator probably wanted us to hope Maisie would learn a valuable lesson about gratitude for what one has. While I had those thoughts as well, I also hoped she’d get a wonderful Christmas gift that matched all of her dreams.

There were a few things about the climax of this story that didn’t quite make sense to me, especially when it came to exactly what Jólakötturinn (The Yule Cat) was capable of. It was never clear to me exactly what the limits of his powers were. Sometimes he seemed capable of things that he hadn’t been a scene before, so I was never sure what to expect from him. It would have been nice to have a firmer understanding of this creature as he was definitely a scary one!

The world building was handled nicely. I appreciated the fact that the author explained a little bit about the backstory of Jólakötturinn for anyone who wasn’t already familiar with that. That attention to detail continued on with the descriptions of the other characters, too. All of their histories were important in order to fully understand how Maisie ended up in such a dangerous predicament on December 23.

Let me end this review with my favourite quote from this tale. It captured the themes of it all nicely.

“He grows when he senses fear, and shrinks when he’s content.”

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Unlikely Gleaning: A Review of Harvest

Harvest - A Short Story from the Pumpkin Patch book cover. Image on cover is of silhoutte of man with a pumpkin for a head walking in a pumpkin field while a full moon glows behind him. I’d like to thank Berthold Gambrel for reviewing this book and bringing it to my attention.

Title: Harvest – A Short Story from the Pumpkin Patch

Author: Jason H. Abbott

Publisher: Blue Boar Press

Publication Date: October 7, 2019

Genres: Fantasy, Horror, Historical, Holidays

Length: 19 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 5 Stars

Blurb:

Equal parts eerie, humorous and heartwarming, Harvest is a short story of down-home fantasy and a fairytale for grown-ups best told in the dark…

With whimsical humor and eccentric fantasy dappled in darkness, fans of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett will enjoy this short tale of kindness found in odd places. If quirky characters with a country twang and a fairytale detoured to the pumpkin patch sound good to you, then Harvest will surely prove an entertaining read!

Review:

It’s not every day that horror and humour coexist in the same plot.

Imagine waking up in a pumpkin field and not being able to see or speak. That idea sure made me shudder, especially once Edgar (the protagonist) realized that his head felt like a pumpkin instead of flesh and bone.

What intrigued me even more about it was the fact that this scene was written humorously even more than it was meant to frighten anyone. If horror isn’t a genre you typically read, consider giving this a try anyway. While there was one scary moment near the beginning, the plot has so much else going on in it that I think it will appeal to a lot of different reading demographics.

Sometimes this felt like the opening chapter of a long fantasy novel. There were hints sprinkled here and there to explain what was going on with Edgar’s head and how other folks were dealing with the strange phenomenon on this farm. They quickly coalesced into a surprisingly thorough explanation of how this world worked, especially given the fact that the author had less than twenty pages to work with.

While I was satisfied with what the narrator revealed, I also wanted more. I enjoyed the way the author wrote a short, encapsulated story that also left a lot of room for readers to come up with our own theories about what might happen to the Edgar and Emelia, the woman who helped him, next.

The fairy tale elements of the storyline are best left to new readers to discover for themselves. As much as I want to gush about them, they’re revealed late enough that I don’t want to share any plot twists. Let’s just say that this is a truly magical farm where anything can happen.

Do note that the full blurb for this tale contains spoilers, so reader beware if you’re like me and prefer to be surprised by a book.

If you love Halloween or the fantasy genre, I highly recommend checking out Harvest – A Short Story from the Pumpkin Patch.

 

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Sleeping Beauty Retold: A Review of The Spellbound Spindle

Book cover for Joy V. Spicer's The Spell Bound Spindle. The imagery on the cover is of a rose bush growing around the title and author name. Title: The Spellbound Spindle

Author: Joy V. Spicer

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: 2018

Genres: Fantasy, Fairy Tale, Retelling, Historical

Length: 345 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 4.5 Stars

Blurb:

A misguided elf curses a baby to die on her sixteenth birthday.
Gem elves alter the curse to one of sleep.

But, to break the curse, the elf must die.

Princess Lilyrose seems to have it all, a family who loves her and a betrothed who is also her trusted friend. As the passing years bring the fated birthday closer, as she secretly struggles not to give in to her fear of the curse, she’s determined to live a full life.

She learns to fight. She dares to love. She discovers her true heritage. But when she learns her betrothed’s life is also in danger, she knows she must face the elf and her dark magic to break the curse.

Review:

Some legends deserve to be revisited over and over again. This is one of them.

Sleeping Beauty was one of my all-time favourite fairy tales when I was a child, so I was excited to see how Ms. Spicer reinterpreted it. She found so many interesting takes on these familiar plot twists, from why anyone would want to harm Sleeping Beauty to what happened when a spell didn’t exactly turn out the way the magical being who cast it was expecting it to.

There were a few parts of the world building that I did wish had been explored in more detail. For example, the beginning showed how and why a few young characters were welcomed into families who knew nothing about their true origins. This included a child who was adopted by a royal family and chosen as their heir! I can think of so few examples of this happening in the fantasy genre that I did find myself wishing the narrator had spent more time explaining why this rule was changed. Was there something special about that society that made them unconcerned with where heirs came from? Were most people simply unaware that this child was adopted? Since this sort of thing was a pattern, I thought I should mention it in my review. While I loved the plot in general, a few small tweaks to the world building to explain stuff like this would have catapulted it into a five-star review in my opinion.

One of my favourite parts of the storyline had to do with how well-developed the antagonists were. Yes, they did awful things, but the reasons for those decisions were explained so clearly that I understood them even as I wished they would have made better choices. I’m not generally the sort of reader who sympathizes with villains, so it was a delightful surprise to realize just how much I liked them despite the terrible things they were responsible for. There are many tales out there about protagonists who feel real. While this book had plenty of examples of that as well, it was its treatment of the characters we’re not supposed to root for that was one of my biggest reasons for giving it such a high rating.

Be sure to pay close attention to the characters as they’re introduced. There were a lot of them in this book, and many of them popped up one after another in the first few scenes. Everything you need to know about them and how they’re connected to the other characters is explained if you read thoughtfully. I actually ended up jotting down notes about who everyone was and, in certain cases, what other names they went by. That list was amazingly helpful later on, and I’d recommend doing it for anyone else who wants to stay organized while they read.

Anyone who loves fairy tales or retellings of fairy tales should checkThe Spellbound Spindle out.

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