Tag: book

Book Review: The Unseen Chronicles of Amelia Black

I have not reviewed many ebooks on my blog, but made an exception in this case as I’d been intrigued by the sample chapter and wanted to read the rest. When A.G.R. Moore (@agrmoore on Twitter) approached me, I agreed to review his book, The Unseen Chronicles of Amelia Black.

The book is a little fantasy and a little steampunk: there are wizards and robots and monsters and a haunted forest. And an airship, naturally. The illustrations were done by Gillian Reid and, honestly, were some of the best I’ve seen. It was a perfect marriage of picture and text. Her interpretations really brought the story to life.

I enjoyed Amelia as a heroine, as she’s exactly the type of plucky little girl I would follow into an adventure like this. There is a great exploration of the shades of grey within us all – not all of the good guys are good and even the bad guys are not as they seem. Amelia has powers that she struggles to control, on her quest to find her parents.

The narrative suffered from a slightly disjointed feeling. The action would occasionally leave Amelia for awhile and focus on the other characters, but none of them had the draw for me that she did. It was a quick read and pleasurable.

Some truly not-so-nice things happen to the characters along the way, a few nightmarish moments, so be prepared. This book would be too intense for young children, but might be just right for tweens and, of course, adults who enjoy Young Adult literature. I recommend this book for lovers of Tim Burton, Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, and dark fantasy.

It’s a very affordable buy on Amazon and totally worth it – support indie authors!

Book Review: Lies, Knives, And Girls in Red Dresses

There’s a dark, twisted underbelly to fairytales that modern parents generally do not acknowledge.

Early fairytales were often moralizing, cautionary tales with very real messages: do not walk into the woods alone, do not always trust the honeyed words of strangers, not every fair face is your friend.

In the original tale, the Little Mermaid feels like she is walking on swords when she uses her legs and dies in the end of a broken heart, returning to the sea as foam.

Edmund Dulac

 Our contemporary, sanitized and Disneyfied stories are pastel-colored and always have a happy ending. While there are dark moments (notably Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty terrorized me), we are comforted and secure in the knowledge that our protagonist will succeed in their quest, often accompanied by crooning crabs.

Failure, ruin and despair don’t have much play in modern fairytales, except in books like Lies, Knives and Girls in Red Dresses by Ron Koertge (illustrations by Andrea Deszo).

Koertge makes no bones about his dark retellings; he writes on the first page:

“Do you want to sleep? Find another storyteller. Do you want to think about the world in a new way?

Come closer. Closer, please. I want to whisper in your ear.”

Even the cover promises dark dreams: a lascivious red tongued wolf threatening to gobble a girl in a red dress.

These are true retellings. Do not look here for many happy endings. At best, his characters end up with their expected version of happiness, which isn’t so permanent after all. At worst, maiming, suffering and beautiful death.

If you enjoy the original Grimm Brothers stories, if you like your tales with a razor’s edge, Lies, Knives and Girls in Red Dresses will be your cup of tea. The finely designed laser-cut illustrations from Andrea Deszo give the look of old-world woodcuts, adding a perfect punctuation to the dark-rimmed stories.

Here are twenty reimagined tales, written in free verse ranging from poetic prose to rhymed couplets. It reads like stories rather than poetry, though, and is quite easy to slide into.

My favorite is a series of five stories on Rapunzel, from the point of view of the mother, the father, the witch, the prince and Rapunzel. It will make you rethink Happily-Ever-After.



Lies, Knives and Girls in Red Dresses is available for pre-order on Amazon. It releases July 10, 2012.

Thanks to Candlewick Press and Raquel Matos for the advance copy to review.

The Fairy Ring Flash Fiction Contest Winners

Despite some minor glitches with Blogger, I am determined to post the winners to our super-duper amazing Fairy Ring flash fiction contest.

This contest was held in honor of the release of The Fairy Ring by Mary Losure (Candlewick Press, 2012). Galleys have graciously been provided by Raquel Matos of Candlewick Press.

To qualify, entrants had to write a 300 word work of flash fiction about their fictional (or not) encounter with a fantastical creature. The entries were incredibly diverse: we saw stories of elves and faeries, unicorns and goblins, changelings and mermaids, ghosts, gnomes and killer fae that defied description.
Despite being 300 words, the stories were comical, tragic, silly, powerful, lyrical, dynamic, unexpected, horrifying and more. I strongly urge you, if you have not read all 54 of the entries (yes, you read that right), please go and click on the thumbnails at the bottom of the contest page. If you enjoy what you read, please consider commenting. A considered compliment is always appreciated.
Now, the prizes.

1st Place: A copy of The Fairy Ring and a 10 page edit by Anna Meade. They will have their blog link shared on the Google+ page of Candlewick Press.

2nd Place: A copy of The Fairy Ring and a 5 page edit by Anna Meade.

3rd Place: A copy of The Fairy Ring.

I have added a special category – the Yearning for Wonderland Award, the story that best communicates the idea of this blog. This winner will be awarded a guest posting on Yearning for Wonderland.
In closing, I must say that the caliber of writers in this competition made decisions practically impossible. If I had a dollar for every person who said ‘Gosh, I don’t envy you this decision’, I could switch to blogging full-time. I am no stranger to tough decisions – I have cast theatrical productions and judged other contests – but this was a whole other level of splitting hairs on excellence.
Without further ado, here are the winners.

My Photo“Transported”, Matthew’s story is paced perfectly. He slowly builds dread; the reader senses something bad will happen to little Izzy, but can’t help but go on. That is true craft. Also, who reading this has not lost themselves in a book to sometimes catastrophic results?
Matt wins a copy of The Fairy Ring book and a 10 page edit by myself. WOOOT!
Steven’s entry took a classic backwoods cabin drunken love story and gave it a savage twist. Attention: it has a little sauce, for people who are bothered by that kind of thing…or for those who like it (PG-13). Not your grandfather’s fairytale and that is why Steven has won a copy of The Fairy Ring and a 5 page edit by yours truly.
3RD PLACE: KERN WINDWRAITH for “GREEN GROW THE RUSHES”

My PhotoKern’s excellent story was entry #54 and she linked it in, seriously, about 23 minutes before the contest closed. Not to encourage procrastination, but her masterful portrayal of childhood creepy set me back on my heels.  Kern has won her own copy of The Fairy Ring too!

Daniel’s story deserves special mention for its perfect balance of darkness and poignancy. His prose grabs you; I defy you to stop before the last line. He has been awarded a guest post on Yearning for Wonderland.
I should also mention the winners of our FanFav contest on Twitter, held on the 20th. Everyone had three votes, which they tweeted. The FanFav contest closed when the Fairy Ring contest did. After the votes were tallied, here were the results:
Ruth won the vote on our Twitter contest! Her award was an illustrated PDF of her story, courtesy of the talented Tina Ramey. You can check it out here.

Mckenzie is our youngest entrant at 16, though you certainly can’t tell it from her sophisticated storytelling. She came in second on our FanFav contest.
Thank you so much for all those who entered, who promoted and shared. This has been a marvelous and humbling experience. Thank you, thank you, thank you. My gratitude is boundless. Thank you to Raquelle Matos of Candlewick Press, who offered the free galleys and triggered the idea. Thank you to Ruth Long who designed the Fairy Ring contest logo.