Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.37 AVERAGE
3.37 AVERAGE
Like most short story collections, a mixed bag. I love fairy tale retellings, and the ones I liked best here tended to stick to one tale and subvert the expectations in a amusingly horrific way (ex. "The Daughter Cells", "The Six Boy Coffins"). "The Rabbit" is truly the creepiest of them all, but some of the others ("The Wedding Party", "The Frog's Princess") were just weird and baffling.
Funky and clever retellings and remixings of classic and lesser-known fairy tales. Some readers might not be familiar with the versions that Lavery uses, as he tends to keep closer to the original Grimm-style tales, rather than the Americanized, Disnified versions that many people grew up with. The motifs throughout the stories offer a very interesting modern commentary on some of the givens in our fairy tales, and whether they really espouse great values through and through. Definitely a book for anyone who delves into fairy tales a lot.
Ortberg takes familiar things - fairy tales, the gender associated to names, marriage roles- and twists them, forcing me to examine societal expectations so ingrained they had become invisible. Almost every story poignantly explores abusive relationships and power dynamics whether between friends, partners, or family.
Many of the stories were genuinely entertaining and thrilling (these are horror fairy tales, after all.) A couple were a little out there, even for me.
A couple of real gems. The Thankless Child, The Rabbit, and Some of Us Had Been Threatening Our Friend Mr. Toad are excellent and creepy. Most of the others are okay. I feel like sometimes the author's wittiness got in the way of the story. I did like that he worked with more than just the classic fairytale stories.
This collection of retellings is a mixed bag -- some truly creepy fairy tale retellings, and some stories that simply failed to make an impression. I particularly loved The Daughter Cells (a retelling of The Little Mermaid) and The Six Boy-Coffins, and thought The Rabbit was splendidly creepy. Worth reading, especially with a familiarity with the original stories.
This book was alright overall! Some pretty great stories and some kinda boring stories. I liked more of the stories than I disliked. Overall a fun book to read when I was bored!
The first story was great but its greatness set me up for disappointment. Many of these stories I just didn't get. And it wasn't as scary as I was hoping it would be. Not a bad read though.
Very strange and very interesting. A retelling of several fairytales.
adventurous
dark
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated