And there are better fairy tale rewrites out there - try the terribly under-appreciated Donna Jo Napoli, who is all about emotional complexity. And I very much wanted to love them, but in the end they were just too straightforward, their prose affected rather than organic, each ending on the same emotional note. I'm so hard on these stories partly because they came so near to being something that I would love. And if Snow White is going to stay with the stepmother who did threaten to kill her, I'd like a little more of the emotional complexity behind that decision. I would like romantic love between women which is a little more hard-won, not the twist ending that these stories made it. If all the witches and the stepmothers are good, if all Rapunzel wants is to stay in her tower and love her foster-mother, what is the story about? These versions too often felt that they were going for the easy way, switching the fairy tales simply to make all the female characters amicable to one another. Threat is powerful - the danger and ugliness of fairy tales are why they have stayed with us so long. I like the idea of lesbian friendly fairy tales - I, for one, am someone who always wanted to kiss the witch, as the title proclaims - but there must be a way of telling those stories without leeching all the power of the original. These are easy reversals of fairy tales, and stand or fall based entirely on the reader's agreement with the reversal, rather than as stories on their own. Using the intricate patterns and oral rhythms of traditional fairy tales, Emma Donoghue wraps age-old characters in a dazzling new skin."įrustratingly simplistic. In these fairy tales, women young and old tell their own stories of love and hate, honor and revenge, passion and deception. Acclaimed writer Emma Donoghue spins new tales out of old in a magical web of thirteen interconnected stories about power and transformation and choosing one's own path in the world. Cinderella forsakes the handsome prince and runs off with the fairy godmother Beauty discovers the Beast behind the mask is not so very different from the face she sees in the mirror Snow White is awakened from slumber by the bittersweet fruit of an unnamed desire. Told with luminous voices that shimmer with sensuality and truth, these age-old characters shed their antiquated cloaks to travel a seductive new landscape, radiantly transformed. Acclaimed Irish author Emma Donoghue reveals heroines young and old in unexpected alliances sometimes treacherous, sometimes erotic, but always courageous. Thirteen tales are unspun from the deeply familiar, and woven anew into a collection of fairy tales that wind back through time.
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