Old Mrs. Bell: a fractured "fairytale"

Well, actually a Christmas song. My least favorite Christmas song.

(Warning: Silliness ahead! Okay, carry on.)

In the backyard, Grandma Bell's green-cloaked figure lay stretched out, half sunk into the snow.

My brothers and I looked at each other with wide eyes. What kind of creature would be tough enough to best her? Even at 112, she could have won a fight with most of the younger wizards in the neighborhood. Nobody tangled with old Mrs. Bell. She was a grandma to be proud of, and all of us younger Bells adored her. If she was hurt...!

I recovered first and sprinted as best I could to reach her side. Then I looked back. The other boys huddled in the safety of the porch, watching me like owls.

"You chicken or what?" I hollered, but my voice cracked and betrayed me. I wagged my head with exaggerated pity. The act bolstered my deflating courage enough that I dared to wade the last few steps.

"Grandma?"

She groaned. "Sinterklaas!" came out like a muffled curse.

I knelt near her. "Are you okay?" I tried to ignore the ants crawling over my skin. What if it came back? What kind of deer had tracks that big?

She coughed and spit out snow. "Oh, honey, I'm fine."

There were rips in her cloak! And she said she was fine? "Grandma! What happened?"

"A Hyperborean deer! Knocked me down, insolent oaf!" Spitting out more snow, she sat up and took stock of herself. Her gnarled hands searched through the snow. "It's the third time this winter!"

I dug my mittens into the snow and uncovered her broomstick. "Here."

"Thank you, Daniel." She shook snow from her robes and mounted the broomstick. "Oh, I'll have his hide this time, if I have to chase 'im till morning!"

Sparks shot from the bristles and she sped away from us into the wintry night.
-----

The idea came from a list of parody song titles, here.

Review: Heartless, by Anne Elisabeth Stengl

Back cover: Princess Una of Parumvir has come of age and will soon marry. She dreams of a charming prince, but when her first suitor arrives, he's not what she'd hoped. Prince Aethelbald of mysterious Farthestshore has travelled a great distance to prove his love -- and also to bring hushed warnings of danger. A dragon is rumored to be on the hunt and blazing a path of terror.

Una, smitten instead with a more dashing prince, refuses Aethelbald's offer -- and ignores his cautions with dire consequences. Soon the Dragon King himself is in Parumvir and Una, in giving her heart away unwisely, finds herself in his sights. Only those courageous enough to risk everything have a hope of fighting off this advancing evil.

My thoughts: To be honest, when I first saw this series on Goodreads I was more interested in Veiled Rose (the second book) than this one. A girl with a secret, living in the forest, who becomes friends with a boy and helps him hunt for a monster? Yes, please! This one sounded as if the emphasis was more on romance, so I was inclined to buy the other one first, until I saw that this one was free. Yes!

I liked it a lot more than I thought I would. The story has an old-fashioned beginning that takes time to build up. When the Dragon King finally breaks into the castle it gets pretty intense. You might suspect, with how many times dragons have laid waste to kingdoms in stories, that this would be clichéd, but oh, it's not. The Dragon is interested in more than just killing and maiming, more than just treasure. . . he wants Una, and what he wants to do with her is terrifying -- he wants to turn her into a dragon. He's so powerful, that they can't keep him out of the castle, and he succeeds. That's the point when the story really becomes a fairytale, Grimm-style. I had dreams about it for days, and I had to start my own story to help myself think about it. Books that are thought-provoking like this are the best kind.

I definitely liked Felix better than Una. The scenes where Aethelbald helps him learn swordfighting are wonderful ones. Una drove me crazy with her silly dislike of Aethelbald. He wasn't romantic enough for her? But he came from the faery realm! How could she care about his name being hard to pronounce?! *cough* She really should have known better. Of course, I can't say for sure that I wouldn't have been a sucker for Leonard too. I might have been as bad as Una. It made me wonder: would I have told Aethelbald about the horrible nightmares and asked him for help, if it was me? Or would I be just as foolish?

Speaking of Aethelbald, I felt like partway through the story, when he started searching for Una, the symbolism in him was a little too close to the surface and it threw me out of the story a bit. A passing thing, but worth observing. I don't know if I would feel the same way on a second read.

I can't finish this review without mentioning Monster, Una's mysterious blind cat. He came to her from Goldstone Wood, so of course there's much more to him than he appears. He can pass under the gaze of the Dragon without being noticed. He guides Una and tries to help her, and helps Felix and the others find their way when they're lost and fleeing. The fourth book, Starflower, is going to be about him and Dame Imraldera, and I can't wait to read it!

Also: isn't the cover beautiful?

Recommendation: I'd recommend Heartless to anyone who likes fairytales or fantasy stories with a mysterious, eerie atmosphere. It's still free on Amazon and B&N, so check it out!

Author's website: Tales of Goldstone Wood

The Starwood Ladder: a fairytale

photo credit: Lissy Elle Laricchia

I wrote this for a contest, but I missed the deadline by, like, a lot. I'm not really happy with it yet, but I have other stories to work on so I decided to stop fiddling around and post it. The contest page is here. The picture above was the prompt.

Basic idea: A girl without a name befriends a boy from the stars, both destroying and saving her life.


Click here to read the story on Wattpad.

Blog revamp!

So, I kind of ignored this poor blog for a long time. I was moving, and traveling all over, and I didn't have time to keep up with it, or so much as log in. I thought it was supposed to email me if I got comments, but it didn't, so if someone commented, I never even knew. :(

I didn't have time to work on it, and I thought no one was reading anyway, so I took it down. But I have more time now, and I'd still really like to have a blog, so I've decided I'm going to do it with a little more organization. I didn't have a topic before, but now my main topic is going to be books and book reviews, and I'm also going to post pretty things and writing inspiration. (Okay, so it's not the narrowest topic in the world, but it's better than when I didn't have one at all!) And I'll try really hard not to miss comments. And comment on other people's posts. :)

And I think this is worthwhile, because I very much doubt that the world is going to end tomorrow. ;)

More writing music