Black Swan, White Raven (Fairy Tale Anthologies)

Dark and decidedly grown-up stories inspired by fairy tales—from New York Times bestsellers Karen Joy Fowler, Joyce Carol Oates, Susanna Clarke, and more.  This collection from World Fantasy Award–winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling proves that fairy tales don’t have to be for little children and that happily ever after doesn’t necessarily mean forever. Here, the plights of Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Rapunzel, and others are reimagined by some of today’s finest literary talents.   Hansel and Gretel make several appearances, not the least being at their trial for the murder of a supposedly helpless old woman. The real, shocking reason for Snow White’s desperate flight from her home is revealed. And the steadfast tin soldier, made flesh and blood, pays a terrible price for his love and devotion.   The twenty-one stories and poems in this collection run the gamut from triumphant to troubling to utterly outrageous, like Don Webb’s brilliant merging of numerous tales into one wild, hallucinogenic trip in his “Three Dwarves and 2000 Maniacs.” All in all, they mine the fantastical yarns we loved as children for new and darker gold.   Includes stories by Michael Cadnum, Karen Joy Fowler, Michael Blumlein, Nalo Hopkinson, Esther M. Friesner, Joyce Carol Oates, Steve Rasnic Tem, Garry Kilworth, Anne Bishop, Gregory Frost, Sten Westgard, Midori Snyder, Harvey Jacobs, Don Webb, Bruce Glassco, Pat Murphy, John Crowley, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Susanna Clarke, Nancy Kress, and Jane Yolen.

Amazon.com Review

This is the fourth volume in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling's ongoing anthology series that invites modern authors to rewrite classic fairy tales. Like many of the original stories themselves, these retellings are often dark, and many contain erotic subtexts. While some of the authors choose to stick to the more traditional aspects of folklore, others reinvent their tales entirely, such as the seven dwarfs who turn into "Three Dwarfs and 2000 Maniacs" at the hands of author Don Webb. As usual, Datlow and Windling have managed to enlist an impressive roster of professional writers for their project, with headliners such as Joyce Carol Oates, John Crowley, and Jane Yolen. These seasoned veterans are mixed in with some relative newcomers to create a collection that is as diverse as it is unique. --Craig E. Engler

From Library Journal

The fourth book in Datlow and Windling's anthology series of well-known and obscure fairy tales retold by contemporary writers, this collection features 19 short stories and two poems about Snow White, the fisherman and his wife, Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, and others. Writers like Joyce Carol Oates, Pat Murphy, Don Webb, and Jane Yolen put interesting twists to the sanitized Victorian versions we have, proving that these tales, along with the originals, aren't really for children. Highly recommended for fantasy and short story collections.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Datlow and Windling strike again, with a fourth set of fantasy tales that aim to bring out the subtexts of classic fairy tales. The stories are uniformly well crafted, and their authors range from distinguished names like Jane Yolen and Esther Friesner to comparative newcomers, such as Anne Bishop. Many of them also feature curious revisions (e.g., the stepmother here saves Snow White from a gruesomely abusive father, and the seven dwarfs are seven wise women) and intense and lengthy emotional outpourings worthy of an encounter group. In the main, they draw on only a limited range of the body of European folklore and let the rest of world folklore be. Plainly, there is now an audience for this sort of thing, but how many of the stories in all four collections will remain readable once the social issues they address become passe? Roland Green

From Kirkus Reviews

Fourth in the series of fairy tales reworked for modern audiences (Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears, 1995, etc.). As the editors point out, the stories familiar to us today are drastically edited Victorian variations intended to entertain and instruct children. The older versions, almost invariably darker and more complex, yield no single, unambiguous interpretation, but consist of timeless themes and potent archetypes that new generations of storytellers may draw upon as they will. Of the 19 tales and 2 poems here, the most popular source is Hansel and Gretel (Garry Kilworth, John Crowley, Nina Kiriki Hoffman), followed by Snow White (Don Webb, Pat Murphy) and Sleeping Beauty (Karen Joy Fowler, Michael Blumlein). Other famous contributors include Joyce Carol Oates, Nancy Kress, and Jane Yolen; numbering among the well-known characters in new guises are Thumbelina, Rumpelstiltskin, Rapunzel, the Tin Soldier, the Tinder Box, Thomas the Rhymer (he actually existed), and a certain L.R.R. Hood. Fresh, often feminist significance teased out of ancient, ageless tapestries. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Kirkus Reviews

“A potent brew of fairy tales . . . These intoxicating delights are not meant for children or the timid.”

Publishers Weekly

“An enchanting, witty collection of 18 original stories that . . . achieve relevance without losing their patina of magic. . . . This superior volume proves that the notion of modern-day Grimms, Andersens and Wildes isn’t just a fairy tale.”

About the Author

Ellen Datlow, an acclaimed science fiction and fantasy editor, was born and raised in New York City. She has been a short story and book editor for more than thirty years and has edited or coedited several critically acclaimed anthologies of speculative fiction, including the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror series and Black Thorn, White Rose (1994) with Terri Windling. Datlow has received numerous honors, including multiple Shirley Jackson, Bram Stoker, Hugo, Locus, and World Fantasy Awards, and Life Achievement Awards from the Horror Writers Association and the World Fantasy Association, to name just a few. She resides in New York.   Terri Windling is a writer, editor, and artist specializing in fantasy literature, folklore, and mythic arts. She has published over forty books, receiving nine World Fantasy Awards, the Mythopoeic Award (for her novel The Wood Wife), the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFWA’s Solstice Award for “outstanding contributions to the speculative fiction field as a writer, editor, artist, educator, and mentor.” She writes essays on folklore and fantasy; maintains a popular blog on these subjects (Myth & Moor); and is on the board of the Chichester Centre for Fairy Tales, Folklore, and Speculative Fiction (Chichester University). She also creates myth-inspired visual art for exhibition in the US and Europe; and she’s a member of the Modern Fairies music-and-folklore project (Oxford & Sheffield Universities). A former New Yorker, she now lives with her British husband and family in Devon, England.

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