A review by humblebee20
White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link

2.0

Super cool premise, super disappointing execution. I love fairytales and this modern/unconventional collection of retellings and reimaginings sounded like a fun quick read. The cover was cute and the first story was alright, but as I kept going, I found the stories to drag on without any real substance. Why any of these stories were longer than ten pages at most was beyond me. That and each story felt like it had been written and then attached to a fairytale that seemed "close enough". I struggled to relate them to the stories they were inspired by; honestly most of them just had fairytale writing tropes sprinkled in. Otherwise they feel like so many other forgettable adult short stories that are so vague they forget to be compelling.
If you do feel interested in this book, just read the story about the White Road and maybe the last one. I'm sorry, but even the nice queer relationships couldn't save this slog of a book.