“The Persian Cinderella” is part of Shirley Climo’s lovely picture book series that retells Cinderella stories from different parts of the world. A longer version of this story appears in the Arabian Nights children’s book I blogged about earlier this month. You might also find the story referred to by the title “The Anklet ( Read more... )

I caught an older episode of Law & Order: SVU on TV in which the villain is a man who kidnaps, tortures, and kills women for fame because he can’t get his true crime writing published and one rejection letter in particular says that they’re only accepting books about recent crimes and he’s writing about a serial killer in the 1970s. I’m just. Dude ( Read more... )

I don’t come across many picture books related to The Arabian Nights, so when I saw this one I grabbed it off the shelf and began reading right away. The book features eight stories, the first of which tells how the shah Shahriyar came to marry a new bride every night and execute her in the morning, and how the clever Shahrazade enacted her plan to ( Read more... )

I'm usually not a person to do impulse spending. I keep lists of things I want or need to buy and generally do a good job of sticking to those lists, including books. But not long ago I had almost an hour to kill in a bookstore, which is always a dangerous situation when it comes to restraint ( Read more... )

I’ve been thinking about this post on Tumblr that talks about wanting fantasy heroines who don’t look down on female-coded work. I realized that I couldn’t think of many that specifically fit this description, but I do know of some fantasy novels and short stories that are positive about traditionally feminine tasks:

Dragon Slippers trilogy by ( Read more... )

A large portion of my Saturday evening has been spent watching Sigur Ros’s 2016 road trip video and writing about regicide.

In a fictional sense, of course. No real people, living or already dead, have been harmed in the writing of this first draft.

Now that we've made it past the shortest day of the year (and I’ve already driven through my first snowstorm), I’m in the mood for some winter fairy tales. I only know of three, though ( Read more... )

You have recently accepted a post as a governess to two children in Norfolk, England. Upon arriving (and getting an odd reaction from a husband and wife at the train station when they learn your destination), you learn that you are to be the only adult living in the house and that the last governess posted the position herself before running off ( Read more... )

This book has been on my To Read list for a long time and was part of this year’s goal to get through as many books on the list as possible, starting with the ones that I couldn’t remember what they were about. When I borrowed this book from the library, I thought it would be ghost stories written by Dahl. Instead, the Introduction reveals that in ( Read more... )

This is a worthwhile read for anybody who is looking for a teen novel about creepy schools. Kit Gordy has been dropped off at the boarding school Blackwood Hall for its first school year by her mother and new stepfather immediately before the two adults leave for a European honeymoon ( Read more... )