Olivia Gratehouse’s Rat King takes a familiar fantasy plot and puts the most unusual hero in the center of it—a goblin. Rat King (or RK) is a lowly guard for an elven vampiric lady. She is visited by an adventurer named Teagan who often interacts with the lady of the […]
Havok’s Remember When takes on a journey through the calendar, presenting stories set in specific times of the year. This anthology of flash fiction (1000 words or less) gives us bite-sized tales of time periods (in this case, months) and seasons. I always consider the theme when I rate a […]
The Goose Girl and the Artificial is a novella retelling of “The Goose Girl,” a fairy tale many haven’t read. The original Goose Girl tale is gruesome, but in this steampunk setting, author K. M. Robinson plays with the original elements in a more light-hearted manner. Goselyn is supplanted by […]
Swish by Tom Carter is a paranormal romance (PNR) for young adult readers. Adopted by her uncle, Abigail Lewis is bullied at high school. With only one friend, Abby suffers mean-spirited pranks at school and physical abuse at home. Her life seems bleak until she meets a new neighborhood boy, […]
Fairy tales are retold every year into success fantasy novels. Cinderella and her friends receive the most attention. I have an entire page devoted to Snow White retellings: The Snow White Read-Off. Alas, what about those princesses who aren’t well-known! Are they cheated out of retellings? Fear not. Below is […]
When I was researching my first fairytale novel, Kingdom Come, I wanted a mix of traditional and untraditional princesses. I chose five: two traditional (Cinderella, Snow White), one known but not known as a fairytale princess (The Little Match Girl), and two untraditional. The untraditional choices were Penta, the Handless […]
A post for Tell A Fairy Tale Day 2026. In this world of the “Big Three” Princesses of Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty, we forget how many other fairytale princesses/heroines exist. Sure, most remember Beauty, the Little Mermaid, Rapunzel or Red Riding Hood, but what about the others? Most […]
In a prior post, I wrote about following writing rules (then don’t). I referred to why you should follow the rules to avoid common mistakes. In this post, I’ll describe some of those mistakes and why they may diminish the writing. Indeed, I’ve made all these mistakes. Prologues and Epilogues […]
Paula Chaffee Scardamalia’s The Tempting Voice is a romance about a hidden Greek mythological world that co-exists with ours. The novel explores the tropes of forbidden love, personal achievement, the positive and negative of family, and monstrous enemies. The novel alternates point-of-view between two main characters – Nik and Marie […]
Grandfather’s Whispers, a novel by Stacy N. Elliott, examines in prose the burden that some of us bear through life. The novel is a magical realism story about Sarah, a seventeen-year-old girl, and her grandfather, Ralph. A group of raucous boys start off Sarah’s day by running her off the […]