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nancyotoole's review
4.0
Retold collects the first year of short fiction published on the Book Smugglers Blog. All six stories are focused around the topic of subversive fairy tales, and they often have a feminist bent. Beyond that, the stories here cover a wide variety of topics, cultures, and even age groups (Hunting Monsters and The 99th Bride could be classified as YA, and The Astronomer Who Met the North Wind is Middle Grade). Unlike some other anthologies, even though the amount of stories is on the short side (six), there is a lot of supplemental material, including essays and interviews with the various writers, which allows the reader to experience the story with an extra layer of depth.
As far as my experience goes, I enjoyed all of the stories found within, with the exception of one, which I thought was just okay. I found the stand out story to be the longest, The 99th Bride, where Catherine F. King adds her own twists onto the classic story Arabian Nights, of which I am a big fan of. Other stand out stories include Hunting Monsters, which draws from a variety of stories such as Red Riding Hood and Beauty and the Beast, and In Her Head, In Her Eyes, a horror tinged story which draws it's inspiration from a Japanese folktale.
If you enjoy fairy tale retellings, and feminist short fiction, then this would be a great choice.
As far as my experience goes, I enjoyed all of the stories found within, with the exception of one, which I thought was just okay. I found the stand out story to be the longest, The 99th Bride, where Catherine F. King adds her own twists onto the classic story Arabian Nights, of which I am a big fan of. Other stand out stories include Hunting Monsters, which draws from a variety of stories such as Red Riding Hood and Beauty and the Beast, and In Her Head, In Her Eyes, a horror tinged story which draws it's inspiration from a Japanese folktale.
If you enjoy fairy tale retellings, and feminist short fiction, then this would be a great choice.
pers's review
4.0
Ever since reading 'Fawn', I've had a bit of a thing for re-imagined fairy tales, and this slim collection fits right in.
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