She's a devout reader of holy books and is well-versed in the military strategy text Belleza Guerra, but she has been kept in ignorance of world affairs. 10-14)Īdventure drags our heroine all over the map of fantasyland while giving her the opportunity to use her smarts.Įlisa-Princess Lucero-Elisa de Riqueza of Orovalle-has been chosen for Service since the day she was born, when a beam of holy light put a Godstone in her navel. Young readers who like Robin McKinley’s fairy-tale retellings will also enjoy this collection. Teachers who use fairy tales in the classroom will find this an effective and amusing collection, with just the right amount of snappy sarcasm to snag the junior-high set. Although the stories are rather a bit much to read all at once, separately they are both clever innovations on the traditional tale and useful instructionally in analyzing motivation and character. Rumpelstiltskin, the main character is a neighbor of the miller and his daughter, an unpleasant witch-like woman who wants a daughter of her own to raise (in a locked tower, as it turns out). The father solves the gold-spinning problem himself in one story, and the exemplary king rids himself of a greedy, conniving miller’s daughter in another. The following three stories have human characters taking on the role of Rumpelstiltskin within the story structure. In the first, Rumpelstiltskin is a mean troll who wants to eat a baby for lunch in the second, he is a helpful, gentle elf who eventually rescues the miller’s daughter and her baby from an uncaring king and in the third, Rumplestiltskin is a domovoi, a furry Russian creature who lives under the floorboards of the castle, simply trying to keep all the humans happy.
The first three stories deal with the motivation of the Rumpelstiltskin character. Each of her short stories then addresses one of these problems in various clever ways.
She begins in an introduction by examining the logical fallacies inherent in the traditional versions of “Rumpelstiltskin,” detailed in a slightly sarcastic style that will appeal to junior-high students. 1366, etc.) extends this popular subgenre into the upper-elementary through junior-high level, with her collection of six short stories on a Rumpelstiltskin theme. Of making many books there is no end, and of making many fairy tales with alternate settings, characters, or perspectives there clearly is no end in sight.
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