Fairy Tales and/or Retellings of Fairy Tales Genre Discussion

[gali]

This month we will be discussing fairy tales and/or retellings of fairy tales.

Fairy Tale
- "a children's story about magical and imaginary beings and lands."
- "an instance of a folklore genre that takes the form of a short story."

Retelling of a Fairy Tale
- a story that takes a fairy tale and changes plot points, characters, and/or themes, but a reader can still identify the original tale

Here are some guiding questions:

• What book/tale did you read?
• Was the story an original fairy tale or a retelling?
• If it was a retelling, how close was it compared to the original fairy tale?
• What rating would you give this read?
• Would you recommend the book you read? Why or why not?

[Kreads1]

I read Sea Witch by Sarah Henning.

This book was a retelling of the story of the Sea Witch from Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid.

I loved the writing style of this author and the descriptive nature of the storyline. I was expecting the story to follow that of Anderson’s with moderate variations, but this book really surprised me! There are certainly nods to the original but there are enough variations to make this story of the Sea Witch truly and exciting one. The suspense and twists had me guessing what would happen to the near end of the book, which is usually hard to do.

I gave this book 4 out of 4 stars and I’m looking forward to reading the sequel as well.

[gali]

I read Sea Witch by Sarah Henning.

This book was a retelling of the story of the Sea Witch from Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid.

I loved the writing style of this author and the descriptive nature of the storyline. I was expecting the story to follow that of Anderson’s with moderate variations, but this book really surprised me! There are certainly nods to the original but there are enough variations to make this story of the Sea Witch truly and exciting one. The suspense and twists had me guessing what would happen to the near end of the book, which is usually hard to do.

I gave this book 4 out of 4 stars and I’m looking forward to reading the sequel as well.

Sounds good! Is it a stand-alone?

[Kreads1]

Sounds good! Is it a stand-alone?

It was really good! It’s not a stand-alone though. The second book is Sea Witch Rising. I still need to read it, hoping it’s as good or better then the first.

[engarl]

I read Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George. I am fairly certain that this is a retelling of a fairy tale, rather than an original, because I’ve heard other variations of it before, but they are all pretty similar. There aren’t a lot of plot differences between the myriad versions of this fairy tale and they all stick pretty close to the original story as far as I’m aware.

I would give this book a rating of 4 out of 4. While a fairly short book, it was full of descriptive detail and character points that really gave a depth to the story. I definitely recommend reading this book and the other fairy tale retelling books by Jessica Day George! I love that she takes lesser known fairy tales and adapts them to her books. For example, Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow is based off of a Norwegian fairy tale that slightly resembles beauty and the beast, but with different motivations for the plot. She also writes a novel based on the 12 Dancing Princesses story, called Princess of the Midnight Ball which I also highly recommend!