A review by giantarms
Wonder Tales: Six French Stories of Enchantment by

I cannot, in my current state of mind, enjoy these though I am sure they are charming. I read the first story and decided to put this one down. Called "The White Cat," here is how it goes:

Spoiler

A prince, who is described as Good, has to go on these arbitrary scavenger hunts in a competition with his two older brothers for his father's crown. The king wants to give up the crown because he is approaching the age where he is likely to be murdered by one of his own sons in order to take it. Delightful. But the young prince is, as has been stated, Good. So we follow him on his quests.

Each time he sets off, he goes to this gorgeous palace made of otherworldly materials that is owned by the White Cat who takes an interest in Our Hero. She provides him the object he needs to fulfill the quest and they spend the rest of the quest period dicking about together how royals do. This seems to involve a lot of chess and hunting. I'm not sure this is a royal thing so much as a cat thing, but at one point the White Cat stages a naval battle between her cat courtiers and the rats. The rats have the advantage at first (because they can swim), but the cats eventually get the upper hand at which point the White Cat calls the battle to end. Her logic is that if the cats kill all the mice, they will have nothing do and get restive. Ah. Such wisdom.

This is all just a very long framing story for the real tale. Eventually, the thing the prince needs to fetch is a wife. Now, because the prince is Good, when the White Cat says, "Hey man, I want you to murder the hell out of me" he does it. The Cat is revealed to be Actually a Princess. Apparently, her mom, a human queen and a richer one than the prince's (never mentioned) mom, liked to travel. One day she was in the hinterlands and heard about some fairy place with very good fruit. She was seized with a craving for it and tried to get it, but she couldn't figure out how to enter the garden. She sits there, retinue and all, for SIX WHOLE WEEKS while PREGNANT and wasting away because she wants . . . fruit?

OBVIOUSLY this fairy fruit has put the magic disease in her brain and body because there is no way a pregnant woman is going to eat nothing for six weeks and also not, uh, die. Nevertheless, because she accepts the fairies' offer of fruit for unborn baby (she figured if she didn't get the fruit she'd die anyway), she is the one who gets blamed at the very end of the tale for screwing up. (The baby gets turned eventually into the White Cat because she tried to pull a Rapunzel and got caught.)

So, there were a lot of places where this story could have gone weird and wonderful, but ultimately, here's what the author suggests are the takeaways for us (emphasis mine):

This young prince was lucky indeed
To find in a cat's guise an august princess
Whom he would later marry, and accede
To three thrones and a world of tenderness.
When two enchanting eyes are inclined
To inspire love, they seldom find resistance, [lol -- ed.]
Especially when a wise and ardent mind
Moves them to inspire lasting allegiance.
I'll speak no more of the unworthy mother
Who caused the White Cat so many sorrows
By coveting the fruit of another,
Thus ceding her daughter to the fairies' powers.
Mothers, who have children full of charm,
Despise her conduct, and keep them from all harm.

TL;DR: An ensorcled woman is blamed for all the problems and that is the moral, I guess.

I'm sure these stories are great, and I really did enjoy imagining the palace (because I am a fool for gemstones and butterfly wings) but it's not what I need right now.

But I am enjoying the story about a dude who's nose fell off. Aw yeah.