Review by New York Times Review
FAIRY TALE RETELLINGS: Climb up a pile of these revamped, remixed and rehabilitated classics and we reach high enough to wake the giant. And yet, no matter how much we empower the princess, humanize the witch and emasculate the prince, or how earnestly we whack and whittle these tales to reflect us, we seem only to make the original tales stronger. At first glance, a new version of "Vasilisa the Beautiful" seems to stand apart from the glut of retellings by choosing not to revise at all. Anthea Bell's text faithfully recounts the Russian fairy tale about a young girl left with a magical doll by her dying mother, who vows that the doll will look after her in difficult times. Vasilisa's father remarries a cruel woman who sends her stepdaughter on an errand to the witch Baba Yaga, expecting her never to return. With the help of her magical doll, Vasilisa passes Baba Yaga's tests and earns the twin totems of Ever After: revenge on her tormentors and a rich, handsome prince. Bell and the illustrator, Anna Morgunova, might believe "Vasilisa the Beautiful" stands the test of time, but they have their work cut out. First, there's that title. In an era when even Disney must thaw frozen, passive princesses, Vasilisa is blond, meek and barely lifts a finger. Even with subtle additions emphasizing her courage, it's the doll that's the hero, whisking through Baba Yaga's tasks, keeping her owner safe, and ensuring she finds her prince. (How Vasilisa wins him is itself sticky - he marries her because she's pretty and a good seamstress. Angela Carter would have picked his bones clean.) But Morgunova's illustrations hint at a rich inner life beneath the surface. With each image set askew, often superimposed against a starry sky, the effect is to emphasize all the characters' powerlessness in Baba Yaga's great forest. Vasilisa is always falling, reeling or sprawling; birds and fish dwarf humans in their size; and even Baba Yaga herself never fully appears, drawn only as feathers and fog, as if she's half Mother Earth and half Zen harpy. The art, so timeless and raw, offers a charged dream-life that suggests the primal nerve Vasilisa's story strikes in Morgunova is far stronger than the lure of revisionism. In contrast, Neil Gaiman's "The Sleeper and the Spindle," intended for a young adult audience, is nothing but revision. Here, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White are contemporaries, with the latter postponing her marriage to rescue the slumbering princess from a wicked fairy. The iconography is familiar - sidekick dwarves, thorn-covered castle, a bitter old witch - but Gaiman's mash-up is unabashedly feminist. The prince sulks over the delayed wedding, while Snow White dons chain mail and rides out to save the day. The gnarled, ugly witch is certainly more than she seems. And the princely kiss that wakes a sleeping beauty doesn't involve a prince at all. Plenty of authors have tried such tactics, only to succumb to another hazard of retelling - the niggling feeling that when all is said and done, what we're reading is souped-up fan fiction. But Gaiman knows fairy tales in his bones, and his work is so sonically tuned that it breathes on its own from the first line ("It was the closest kingdom to the queen's, as the crow flies, but not even the crows flew it"). What's most remarkable about "The Sleeper and the Spindle," besides its string of expert twists, is how it feels told rather than written. Time is elusive, magic is unexplained, personal details ignored ("Names are in short supply in this telling," the narrator affirms). Adding to the wonder are Chris Riddell's dazzling illustrations, black-and-white with flashes of gold, so detailed in their dark imagination that, at times, Gaiman's story seems less a fairy tale and more a bad, beautiful dream. Read this to a child alongside another Grimms tale and he will no doubt think this is the older story. In "The Most Wonderful Thing in the World," Vivian French grapples with a third hazard of fairy tale retellings: fairy tale structure itself. Yearning royals seeking the most wonderful thing in the world is its own subgenre of folklore, with the seekers bounding to the ends of the earth only to find that what they've been hunting was waiting at home all along. These stories skew very young, for a child with even the slightest nose for fairy tales can't help seeing the ending in the setup. Yet, like Bell and Morgunova, French bets on a traditional telling of the tale, even if tweeness hangs over it like a Damoclean sword. Lucia is an overprotected princess, but when the king and queen realize she will one day lead their kingdom, they conclude she will need a husband (those who protest this conclusion won't find sympathy here). They consult the wisest man in the kingdom, who advises them to "find the young man who can show you the most wonderful thing in the world." While the royal couple entertain would-be suitors, Lucia escapes the palace and asks Salvatore, the wise man's son, to show her the city. The king and queen come up short; Lucia and Salvatore find love, and Salvatore offers Lucia as the answer to the riddle and wins her hand. It's as rarefied as it sounds, but French is a skilled storyteller, and with the help of Angela Barrett's illustrations invoking steampunk, Edwardian style and a gilded Venice, she reminds us how fresh a fairy tale can feel in the right hands. The king and queen's quest slyly moves beyond the mundane - a hundred roses, a snowwhite horse - to shimmering fantasies: an aquatic car, a piece of frozen sky, a blue cheetah whose fur reflects a bat-filled sky. In her first trip out of the palace, Lucia explores not a fusty medieval kingdom, but a world of "glittering arcades" and "velvet-curtained mansions," stirring the thought that the most wonderful thing in the world might indeed be a European city free of tourists. It's so alluring a tapestry that when the final revelation takes place in a quiet fairy-tale wood, we feel palpable relief. Perhaps our quest to reinvigorate classic stories is no different from the king and queen's. Again and again, we stray in search of better fortune, only to find our way back home. SOMAN CHAINANI is the author of the School for Good and Evil trilogy.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 11, 2015]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* A king and queen decide to find a suitable husband for their daughter, Lucia. Their adviser, Wise Old Angelo, suggests that they choose a young man who can show you the most wonderful thing in the world. A royal proclamation draws many suitors, who bring a bewildering array of treasures. While her parents evaluate these wonders, Lucia explores the city surrounding the palace with Salvatore, Angelo's grandson. In the end, Salvatore courteously presents the king and queen with their daughter, the most wonderful thing in the world. Having won her heart, he wins her hand. Independent Lucia and unassuming Salvatore marry, securing a happy future for themselves and their kingdom. Set in the time of your grandmother's grandmother (depicted as a Venice-like city during the Edwardian age), this romantic tale unfolds in a precise yet fluid narrative. The beautifully wrought, shaded-pencil drawings are tinted with delicate watercolor washes, which give the scenes a dreamlike quality that complements the story's quiet tone. Children will enjoy the well-told story for its own sake, and the beautifully composed pictures for their intricacy and their sometimes surprising details. Based on a story Barrett loved in childhood, this tale is retold and illustrated with considerable grace.--Phelan, Carolyn Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In "a city of sky-blue water and golden bridges," an overprotective king and queen ponder their sheltered daughter's future. They feel Princess Lucia will require a partner when she inherits the land, so they write to Wise Old Angelo and ask how to "find a suitable husband." Angelo types a letter and sends his grandson, Salvatore, to deliver it; he advises the royals to choose "the young man who can show you the most wonderful thing in the world." Lucia, meanwhile, steps outside the palace and asks the first person she meets-Salvatore-to show her around the city. While would-be suitors showcase "acrobats and airships, pyramids and performing dogs, mysterious magical beasts and a piece of frozen sky," Lucia strolls in sun-drenched piazzas and along Italianate canals with the courtly Salvatore. Though French (the Tales from the Five Kingdoms series) never reveals why Lucia fails to share her identity with Salvatore, Barrett (The Night Fairy) conjures a magical mood, picturing fantasies and modern marvels in jewel-like watercolor vignettes, and a peaceful ambience reigns as Lucia and Salvatore elegantly solve Angelo's puzzle. A mellifluous fairy tale, drenched in Edwardian splendor. Ages 4-8. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 2-4-A king and his queen are hoping to make a good marriage for their daughter and take the advice of a local sage who tells them the successful suitor should show them "the most wonderful thing in the world." In comes a procession of the weird and wonderful mermaids, pyramids, even "a piece of frozen sky." Meanwhile, the princess is with the sage's grandson, exploring the kingdom she will inherit. He has fallen in love with her and makes his own offering; he shows the king and queen the most wonderful thing in the world- their own daughter. French's lyrical narrative tells a simple story well. Barrett's watercolor drawings have the requisite detail to make this a story to pore over, and circulation among the princess- and fairy tale-loving crowd is guaranteed. VERDICT A lovely choice for large collections.-Lisa Lehmuller, Paul Cuffee Maritime Charter School, Providence, RI © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
The king and queen of a charming, Edwardian-era island kingdom decide to marry their daughter Lucia to the suitor who shows them the Most Wonderful Thing in the World. The winning suitor shows them Lucia herself. The lengthy and elegant text paints many intricate word pictures, while Barrett's tiny, delicious watercolors, filled with hidden details, will reward close examination. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The king and queen of a city that reflects a fairy-tale Edwardian version of Venice suddenly realize that their beloved daughter, Lucia, will be queen one day, and she will need a husband. So the king writes (in longhand, on a writing desk) to the wisest man in the kingdom, Old Angelo, who writes back (on a typewriter) that they should choose a suitor who can bring Lucia the item of the title. But Lucia, who does not get out much, finds Salvatore, Angelo's grandson, and asks him to show her the city. While the king and queen exhaust themselves examining what the suitors bringmermaids and airplanes; works of art and weapons of mass destruction ("How can anyone believe weapons are the most wonderful thing in the world?" asks the queen)Lucia and Salvatore visit shops and markets, theaters and book stalls, stroll in piazzas and loggias. King and queen despair, and so does Salvatore, who has fallen in love. Old Angelo brings all the protagonists together, and Salvatore pronounces what the most wonderful thing is: Lucia, of course. Barrett's watercolor illustrations are full of exquisite color and detail, referencing not only Venetian architectural monuments, but Martha Graham dance and the Tin Man among other cultural milestones. Lightly wraps the love of family as the center of life in a silken gown of word and image, with a playful undercurrent of both whimsy and irony. (Picture book. 5-10) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
