 |
| DepositPhoto |
This week’s topic: What fairy tale would we pick to rewrite
and why?
I’ve written a couple of fairy tale themes into my books –
probably most notably with Trapped on
Talonque, which my SFF7 buddy Vivien Jackson was kind enough to mention
earlier this week. Sleeping Beauty has always been one of my all-time favorite
stories, both Disney’s version and the more general folk tale, so I thoroughly
enjoyed taking the concept and running with it. I relished doing a scifi take
on the story… Bithia, the ‘sleeping beauty’ in the novel is from an ancient, spacefaring
civilization. To make the story work I had to think long and hard about
why such a person would be left behind on a more primitive planet by her own
people and how she could survive without aging. Then I got to have fun
imagining what it would be like to be her, and finally be set free…but
thousands of years into her future. Suffice it to say nothing is as she hoped
or expected.
There’s no prince, only my gallant and resourceful Special
Forces soldier, Nate Reilly. He becomes fascinated with Bithia, needs her help
to survive and rescue his men, and of course falls in love with her. Instead of
helpful fairies, we have a clan of priests and priestesses who know many of the
secrets of the Sleeping Goddess, as Bithia is called on Talonque, but have
their own agenda.
And how long can even the best alien technology keep
functioning with no maintenance? (I did enjoy throwing problems at this group
of characters.)
I’ve also invented my own fairy tale, that of The Princess
of Shadows, for the scifi romance Mission
to Mahjundar. Here’s how the novel’s heroine Princess Shalira explains the
story to the Sectors Special Forces soldier who of course will be her handsome
‘prince’: “It’s an old folktale about a girl of royal blood who hid from her
enemies in the shadows of the palace walls, disguised as a beggar, until her
true love rescued her.” Gesturing to her eyes, Shalira said, “It’s meant as an
insult to me, since I can’t see, not even shadows, and I’ve lived the past
fifteen years on the fringes of the court, out of the ‘sun.’ I’m tolerated,
protected only because my mother was the emperor’s Favorite till she died."
The hero is of course thoroughly captivated and determined
to help her.
My personal favorite fairy tale is Cinderella. I’m not that
big on the Disney animated version because frankly there isn’t enough of the
prince in it. I enjoyed the Disney live action version more, principally
because I loved Helena Bonham Carter as the Fairy Godmother. In my opinion they
did not do justice to the waltz in that movie though. The dress, although
impressive, was too big to allow the prince to really dance with her. Mostly he
spun her around to make the dress’s skirt flare out. Okayyyy….
But the best version
I’ve ever seen was Drew Barrymore’s movie “Ever After.” Let me pause a moment
and bask in my happiness s over that retelling! I love to rewatch that one. A
close second for me would be the Rogers & Hammerstein stage musical, as
performed by Lesley Ann Warren in the role of Cinderella for television. So
many good songs, such a handsome prince, and oh the WALTZ.
(I also enjoy the version of the waltz scene the Broadway
cast of ‘Cinderella’ did for the 2013 Tony Awards.)
I’ve actually written a take on Cinderella, set in my
ancient Egyptian paranormal romance world, entitled Healer of the Nile. I had fun figuring out how to work the key
elements of the fairy tale into my Egyptian framework and I was determined to
have Pharaoh be the ‘fairy godfather’ who made things right for Mehyta, my
heroine, and Tadenhut, her disabled soldier hero.
One of the oldest versions of the story actually is from
ancient Egypt, about 2400 years ago, in fact. But my story for Healer was
entirely original and didn’t involve anyone having to fit into any particular
sandal!
Soooo…I’ve basically already written versions of my two
favorite fairy tales. Not saying I won’t ever write another book using a fairy
tale type trope but I don’t feel particularly pulled to do it. I’d say my third
favorite story is Beauty and the Beast as done by Disney in the animated
version but at the moment my Muse doesn’t feel inspired.
I will also say that frankly the Brothers Grimm version of anything was too dark, violent and scary
for me as a child. Someone made the mistake of giving me a volume of their
tales when I was a kid, not the cleaned up, pastel cheery Disney versions and I
was horrified. Scarred for life to some extent! So I’m just really not a huge
fairy tale fan. I leave that genre to others!
 |
| DepositPhoto |
