Black Heart, Ivory Bones
10 best books like Black Heart, Ivory Bones (Ellen Datlow): Tam Lin, In the Forest of Forgetting, The Wild Swans, White as Snow, The Orange Fairy Book, The Armless Maiden: And Other Tales for Childhood's Survivors, Jack, the Giant Killer, Off with Their Heads!: Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood, Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers Explore Their Favorite Fairy Tales, Fitcher's Brides
In the ancient Scottish ballad Tam Lin, headstrong Janet defies Tam Lin to walk in her own land of Carterhaugh . . . and then must battle the Queen of Faery for possession of her lover’s body and soul.
In this version of Tam Lin Janet is a college student, "Carterhaugh" is Carter Hall at the university...
| Author | Theodora Goss |
| ISBN | 1907881182 |
The reprint of In the Forest of Forgetting by award-winning author Theodora Goss, first published in 2006 by Prime Books, with an introduction by Terri Windling and cover art by Virginia Lee. The table of contents has been slightly modified: "Phalaenopsis" has been replaced by "Her Mother's Ghosts,"...
| Author | Peg Kerr |
| ISBN | 0446608475 |
This novel focuses on two outcasts on two journeys in two eras. In 1689 England, Lady Eliza Grey's 11 brothers are turned into swans. Rejected by her father, Eliza is flown to America by her brothers where she has a chance to save them--until she is accused of witchcraft. In the second story, set in 1981...
| Author | Tanith Lee |
| ISBN | 0312875495 |
Once upon a time there was a mirror. . . .
So begins this dark, unusual retelling of the story of Snow White by the writer reviewers have called “the Angela Carter of the fantasy field”—a whole novel based on a beloved story, turning it into a dark and sensual drama full of myth and magic.
Arpazia...
| Author | Andrew Lang |
| ISBN | 0486219097 |
The first Fairy Book I've read so far without any overt racism in it anywhere (and it's the antepenultimate one; sigh).
Look! The black characters get illustrated heroically and everything:
Hooray!
On the other hand, there are quite a few of those stories that...
| Author | Terri Windling |
| ISBN | 0312862210 |
I'm a big fan of Terri Windling, and make an effort to seek out her anthologies. Thus, I got this one. I'd heard rave reviews of it - people saying "This is the one that made a difference in my life!"
I was a bit quizzical about that, because for me, that was 'Bordertown.' And for me, it remains Bordertown,...
| Author | Charles de Lint |
| ISBN | 0441379702 |
I have been meaning to read a book by this author for ages having heard so much about him, all good. And the average rating for this book is over 4 so I thought I was in for a treat! Sadly it turned out to be a very ordinary retelling of a fairy story. Even at a mere 200 pages I found it repetitive and not especially...
| Author | Maria Tatar |
| ISBN | 0691000883 |
When fairy tales moved from workrooms, taverns, and the fireside into the nursery, they not only lost much of their irreverent, earthy humor but were also deprived of their contestatory stance to official culture. Children's literature, Maria Tatar maintains, has always been more intent on producing...
| Author | Kate Bernheimer |
| ISBN | 0385486812 |
New edition (revised and expanded) available 8/13/02.
Fairy tales are one of the most enduring forms of literature, their plots retold and characters reimagined for centuries. In this elegant and thought-provoking collection of original essays, Kate Bernheimer brings together twenty-eight...
| Author | Gregory Frost |
| ISBN | 0765301954 |
The tale of Bluebeard, reenvisioned as a dark fable of faith and truth
1843 is the “last year of the world,” according the Elias Fitcher, a charismatic preacher in the Finger Lakes district of New York State. He's established a utopian community on an estate outside the town of Jeckyll's...
| Author | John Klima |
| ISBN | 1597802204 |
Once Upon A Time...
...in the faraway land of Story, a Hugo-winning Editor realized that no one had collected together the fairy tales of the age, and that doorstopthick anthologies of modern fairy tales were sorely lacking...
And so the Editor ventured forth, wandering the land...
| Author | Ed Gorman |
| ISBN | 0425171280 |
There are some pleasent surprises in this little collection. There are also some duds. Thankfully, however, the gems make up for the dudes. There does seem to be a preponderence of mob stories.
The stories range from funny to touching. Now of them all really sad. Standouts include-
"After...
| Author | Jack D. Zipes |
| ISBN | 0415902630 |
This anthology of feminist fairy tales and critical essays acts as an example of how the literature of fantasy and imagination can be harnessed to create a new view of the world. It demonstrates how recent writers have changed the aesthetic constructs and social content of fairy tales to reflect cultural...
| Author | Kara Dalkey |
| ISBN | 0441574467 |
In this deft and enchanting retelling of the classic Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. Kara Dalkey has mixed history and legend, weaving the Andersen fable into a fascinating novel about court life in ancient Japan -- a life of pageantry and poetry, of great beauty and casual cruelty, of life and courtly...
| Author | Denise Little |
| ISBN | 0886778352 |
How would Little Red Riding Hood's story play if we heard it from the viewpoint of the wolf, and what's the real scuttlebutt about the seven dwarves? Whether they're told to us as bedtime treats or viewed as Disney movies, fairy tales fuel our imagination. Now fantasy's finest indulge themselves and...
| Author | Marina Warner |
| ISBN | 0195178211 |
Once upon a time, in the Paris of Louis XIV, five ladies and one gentleman-- all of them aristocrats-- seized on the new enthusiasm for "Mother Goose Stories" and decided to write some of them down. Telling stories resourcefully and artfully was a key social grace, and when they recorded these elegant...
| Author | Kathleen Ragan |
| ISBN | 0393320464 |
Dismayed by the predominance of male protagonists in her daughters' books, Kathleen Ragan set out to collect the stories of our forgotten heroines. Gathered from around the world, from regions as diverse as sub-Saharan Africa and Western Europe, from North and South American Indian cultures and...
| Author | Charles Vess |
| ISBN | 0765312158 |
In this graphic novel, Charles Vess illustrates many traditional folk ballads that have been rewritten by some fairly popular fantasy artists like Neil Gaiman or Emma Bull.
I didn't realize how many traditional ballads have negative interactions with strangers as their primary topic....
| Author | Angela Carter |
| ISBN | 0141195886 |
'Curiosity is the most fleeting of pleasures; the moment is satisfied, it ceases to exist and it always proves very, very expensive.'
Angela Carter's playful and subversive retellings of Charles Perrault's classic fairy tales conjure up a world of resourceful women, black-hearted villains,...
