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Silver Birch, Blood Moon (Fairy Tale Anthologies) Kindle Edition

by Ellen Datlow (Editor), Terri Windling (Editor), Neil Gaiman (Contributor), Format: Kindle Edition
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 258 ratings
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Winner of the World Fantasy Award: New twists on classic fairy tales from Neil Gaiman, Patricia Briggs, Robin McKinley, Caitlín R. Kiernan, and more.

Long ago, when we were children, our dreams were inspired by the fairy tales we heard at our mothers’ and grandmothers’ knees—stories of princesses and princes and witches and wondrous enchantments, by the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen, and from the pages of 1001 Arabian Nights. But, as World Fantasy Award–winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling remind us, these stories were often tamed and sanitized versions. The originals were frequently darker—and in Silver Birch, Blood Moon, they turn darker still.

Twenty-one modern Grimms and Andersens—masterful storytellers including Neil Gaiman, Nancy Kress, and Tanith Lee—now reinvent beloved bedtime stories for our time. The Sea Witch gets her say, relating the story of “The Little Mermaid” from her own point of view. “Thumbelina” becomes a tale of creeping horror, while a delightfully naughty spin is put on “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” Author Caitlín R. Kiernan transports Snow White to a dark, gritty, industrial urban setting, and Patricia Briggs details “The Price” of dealing with a royal and unrepentantly evil Rumpelstiltskin.

Rich, provocative, and unabashedly adult, each of these tales is a modern treasure, reminding us that wishes have consequences and not all genies have our best interests at heart.
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  1. Book 5 of 6
    Fairy Tale Anthologies
  2. Print length
    432 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  5. Publisher
    Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
  6. Publication date
    Sept. 30 2014
  7. File size
    9919 KB
  8. Page Flip
    Enabled
  9. Word Wise
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  10. Enhanced typesetting
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  11. See all details
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Total Price: CDN$22.87
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Product description

From the Author

Silver Birch, Blood Moon is the winner of the World Fantasy Award in 2000 for Best Anthology. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From Amazon

Forget about Andrew Lang--Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling argue that fairy tales are not the pastel fantasies of Victorian children's books but rather are drawn with primary passions: love, hate, greed, sacrifice, joy, and sorrow. Silver Birch, Blood Moon is their fifth anthology of original stories with fairy tale sources, "reimagined" for adults.

Nancy Kress retells "The Emperor's New Clothes" with a delightful twist in "Clad in Gossamer"; Harvey Jacobs unleashes laughter with "The Vanishing Virgin," starring an untalented magician, his lovely but frozen assistant, and "a balding, sullen rabbit" called Pooper; Michael Cadnum and Nalo Hopkinson present equally pointed but distinctly different takes on the story of two sisters spelled to speak according to their natures in "Toad Rich" and "Precious"; Wendy Wheeler reworks "Beauty and the Beast" using Caribbean colors in "Skin So Green and Fine"; and Richard William Asplund blends the Arabian genie with the wonder-working rabbi of Hasidic legends to create "The Dybbuk in the Bottle."

The stories here are less gruesome than in the previous collections, and both sexes claim heroic as well as villainous characters. So enter imagination's marketplace, and watch the storytellers at work. It's amazing what they can do with a bit of old legend. --Nona Vero

--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00MO0N25O
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy (Sept. 30 2014)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 9919 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 432 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 258 ratings

About the authors

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  1. Terri Windling

    Terri Windling

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    Terri Windling is a writer, artist, and book editor interested in myth, folklore, fairy tales, and the ways they are used in contemporary arts. She has published over 40 books (novels, children's books, and anthologies), winning nine World Fantasy Awards, the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFWA Solstice Award for "outstanding contributions to the speculative fiction field as writer, editor, artist, educator, and mentor." Her adult novel "The Wood Wife" won the Mythopoeic Award for Novel of the Year, and her collection "The Armless Maiden" was shortlisted for the James Tiptree Jr. Award. She has also published numerous essays on myth, fairy tales, mythic arts, and fantasy literature.

    "If there is a single person at the nexus of fantasy literature, it is Terri Windling -- as writer, as painter, as editor, as muse." - Jane Yolen

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  2. Ellen Datlow

    Ellen Datlow

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    I've been a short story editor for over forty years, starting with OMNI Magazine and webzine for 17 years, then EVENT HORIZON, a webzine, and SCIFICTION, the fiction area of SCIFI.COM. I currently acquire and edit short fiction and novellas for Tor.com and I edit original and reprint anthologies. I've lived in NYC most of my life, although I travel a lot.

    See more on the author's page
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Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
258 global ratings

Top reviews from Canada

jodylync
5.0 out of 5 stars Dark Fun
Reviewed in Canada on May 13, 2000
Remember those Fairy Tales you read when you were a kid? There were evil stepmothers, good fairies, greedy kings, and beautiful princesses. Even though these stories had happy endings, you still felt there was something dark just under the surface that just didn't quite add up. This book (and others in the series) takes your favorite tales and shows you what might have been going on behind the scenes. An adult twist to children's tales.
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Sara
4.0 out of 5 stars Some good, some bad, but worth a look
Reviewed in Canada on August 22, 2000
As with any anthology, every writer has a different style, and some of the styles you won't be wild about. But being an anthology, you can also skip over stories that aren't meeting your expectations.
I'll start with the worst stories. Tanith Lee, whose voice is usually sensual and mesmerizing falls a little flat with 'Kiss Kiss', a new take of the Frog Prince tale. 'Toad' another Frog Prince story is also a bore, but still, the worst are pretty much just stories that don't stand out in the whole of the book.
My favorite short stories were probably these ones: 1)Glass Coffin by Caitlin R. Kiernan was a lyrical and haunting mixture of Sleeping Beauty and Snow White. 2)Precious by Nalo Hopkinson is a story that goes past the story and wonders what happens to the girl who's been 'blessed' with jewels every time she talks. 3)The Sea Hag by Melissa Lee Shaw is a great story that goes behind the whole 'villian' persona and gives the 'villian' her own voice. 4)Ivory Bones by Susan Wade is a poetic and saddening story of Thumbelina with an ending not expected. 5)The Wild Heart by Anne Bishop was another haunting story by Anne Bishop, who has a natural talent for writing.
There are other worthwhile entries, such as Clad in Gossamer and The Shell Box to check out. Overall it is a satisfying read of adult fairy tales.
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A. Roberts
3.0 out of 5 stars Good and bad
Reviewed in Canada on August 20, 2001
Silver Birch, Blood Moon mixes good re-tellings with horrible ones. It has stories that are funny, evil, good, terrible, brand new, re-told, and many others. I don't feel like I wasted my time reading it but there are better out there. I guess it is the same with all mixed books. I enjoyed a lot of the stories, despised about as many. I loved the re-telling of The Little Mermaid in The Sea Hag, but didn't aprove of The Glass Cofin which was just depressing. It was a good book and was enjoyable. I recomend it.
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Cheyenne
2.0 out of 5 stars A sad, sad thing
Reviewed in Canada on June 2, 2001
Somebody made a grave mistake! I was surprised by the lack of good stories in this one as compared to the other dark fairy-tale collections by these editors, all of which were endlessly satisfying to me. This book I bought on a whim before I had read it....what a waste of money! Terribly dissapointing, although there are decent parts in the book, hidden in a nook or cranny if you look enough. Save yourself the money and rent this from the library if you don't believe me...maybe you'll end up agreeing with me.
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Top reviews from other countries

Afresh30
5.0 out of 5 stars Buy this book....
Reviewed in the United States on April 6, 2015
Verified Purchase
I've tried to wait until I'm not gushing about this book yet I can't. I rarely give five stars this book deserves it. I'm a woman who as a child enjoyed fairy tales on both sides(the light and dark tales) and it awakened in me love for reading. I have a few hard copies of the series and I missed a few then I found them on kindle. I truly liked these stories not one was disappointing and we know in anthologies there is usually a few that we skip thru, not here, each was engaging, entertaining and complete. I felt like I was revisiting some old friends, in tale and authorship and met a few who impressed me greatly. I know this book has been out for awhile for those people come back for a new look, for the new, ahhh just sit back relax and enjoy these tales. I recommend this book and all of them in the series.
10 people found this helpful
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Harold Birtwistle
5.0 out of 5 stars Sets a standard that is very hard to beat
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 3, 2015
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This is one of a series of 6 books of short stories based upon or inspired by fairy tales but you should re me more that the originals were very different to the 'happy ever after' tales that are in circulation today.
Many of the stories are by authors prominent in the field of fantasy and the rest aren't well known (at least to me) but what they all have is a range of new, entertaining ideas, some quirky, some amusing and some with unexpected twists.
There's no horror or shivers here but there's much to set you thinking and very nearly every yarn is enjoyable but beware - if you enjoy this book you may well feel you have to read the other five.
Finally, one regret: I should have read the stories on which these are based before I started!
Ps. Wonderful cover artwork
One person found this helpful
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tilla
4.0 out of 5 stars A very varied bunch of stories
Reviewed in the United States on February 12, 2019
Verified Purchase
An interesting collection of fairytales made new. Some of them are just lovely; others are anything but. They're all interesting and wildly different from the stories you read as a kid or that mom might've read to you.

I think my favorite was the Rumplestiltskin remake as the miller's daughter was able to see beyond the surface and the Rumplestiltskin character wasn't an evil little gnome while the handsome young king was a jerk and stupidly cruel. There were a couple of stories I had a hard time getting into and a couple I didn't care much for, but mostly they were at least interesting and some were almost enough to make you cry happy tears
12 people found this helpful
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Kindle Customer
3.0 out of 5 stars Nothing to write home about
Reviewed in the United States on April 25, 2015
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Retellings of well known fairy tales. A few original takes, but overall nothing new.
2 people found this helpful
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EK Brown
5.0 out of 5 stars excellent read
Reviewed in the United States on April 4, 2023
Verified Purchase
These are all good stories. I love anthologies because they give me an exposure to new artists. I will be getting more from these authors.
One person found this helpful
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