Sam @ A Journey Through Pages put a call out for other bloggers to join her in a celebration of YA Fairytale Adaptations. Now, I have to say I don’t do a lot of YA reading of Fairytale novels. I have however read a couple of adult adaptations, children’s fairytale adaptations and another historical fiction fairytale that I can talk about.
I have already published three reviews of adult Fairytale adaptations:
Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier
The Fairy Godmother and Beauty and the Werewolf by Mercedes Lackey
These two authors are very different in style and execution. While I’m a fan of Mercedes Lackey from a long while back, this was one of the first novels of Juliet Marillier’s I read and reviewed.
Lackey makes believable characters in The Fairy Godmother, and focusses on them to the exclusion of all else. She warps the fairytales and creates ‘The Tradition’, a guiding force which forces people to follow their fairytales to a set conclusion – unless they are changed by Fairy Godmothers or the like. Lackey immediately draws you in, and it’s a great ride all the way through the book. A very enjoyable introduction to Lackey’s writing. Beauty and the Werewolf is actually the sixth book in the series, but you won’t spoil anything for yourself by reading it first.
Differently from Lackey, Marillier does a true adaptation, staying strictly to the tale of the six swan brothers and the sister who can’t talk until she has finished weaving her shirts for them. Nevertheless, Marillier puts a new spin on the book, and you are driven by her vibrant formation of the world around her characters. That’s not to say she doesn’t put effort into her character development – she does, but the thing I appreciate most about her novels is her rich world-building.
A YA fairytale I have previously read::
Scatterheart by Lili Wilkinson
I didn’t love this novel, for reasons I have outlined within the review. Yes, it’s not a traditional Fairytale because that element is only a supportive idea for the historical fiction, but I felt it was worth including here as an example of me not always loving Fairytales!
This week I have lined up for you several more in the Five Hundred Kingdoms series (One Good Knight, The Fortunate Fool, The Snow Queen, The Sleeping Beauty) and a couple of short Fairytales by the estimable J.K. Rowling. I’ll try and read some more soon, but I think for the weeks that this will be happening I will be on holidays in the States! I’m pretty excited about that, and I’ll be sure to pick up more books while I’m away. Let the week begin!
A final note: I’ll be updating this post as the week progresses.
Here is a quick link for entering Sam’s giveaway! You can sign up here, or on her website, either way will get you entered to win some awesome books. Personally I’m hoping to get my hands on the Juliet Marillier novel, either in this giveaway or through The Book Depository.
