Aimee Ogden - Tor/Forge Blog

Fairy tales are classic! They’ve become timeless, and timeless stories are retold and evolve in the retelling. So gather your wits, wish on a lucky star, and stay away from that ominous gingerbread house in the woods, because we’ve compiled a list of titles inspired by fairy tales. Actually, we put this list together last year, but we’re bringing it back now because opens in a new windowIn the Lives of Puppets by TJ Klune is available in paperback now!

Check it out!

opens in a new windowNettle & Bone opens in a new window by T. Kingfisher

Kingfisher flips the fairy tale script in Nettle & Bone, where our main character Marra is the shy, convent-raised, third daughter of a royal family that has married off her older princess sister. After so much silence, Marra will no longer allow her sister to suffer abuse at the hands of a cruel and powerful prince. And what fairy tale would be complete without a band of bandy characters with which to share the journey? Marra’s group includes a disgraced ex-knight, a reluctant fairy godmother, an enigmatic gravewitch and her fowl familiar. Time to topple a throne.

Now available in paperback!

opens in a new windowIn the Lives of Puppets opens in a new window by TJ Klune

Is The Adventures of Pinocchio technically a fairy tale? The writer of this list honestly isn’t sure, but Pinocchio IS in Shrek, so by that metric: Yes.

In the Lives of Puppets is TJ Klune’s Pinocchio-inspired tale about sentient automata exploring what it means to live, love, and reckon with the past. It’s pretty cool.

opens in a new windowA Spindle Splintered opens in a new window by Alix E. Harrow

Zinnia Gray finds herself falling through worlds. Wait, let’s backtrack. Zinnia Gray pricks her finger on a spinning wheel. No, no, a little more. Zinnia Gray has a rare condition that will see her dead before her twenty-second birthday, so her best friend Charm throws her an extra special Sleeping Beauty experience final twenty-first birthday party, where she pricks her finger and commences falling through worlds where she meets another sleeping beauty, also on the run from fate.

opens in a new window opens in a new windowSun-Daughters, Sea-Daughters by Aimee Ogden

This lyrical space opera takes the classic tale of The Little Mermaid, and asks the question: What if this story happened in far future space where humans have used gene-adaption to acclimate themselves to harsh desert and sea climes? It’s a really good question. Daughter of the Sea-Clan, Atuale sparked a war by choosing her land-dwelling love over her home. Now, with a virulent plague sweeping her adopted clan, Atuale can only turn to the infamous mercenary known as the World Witch who also happens to be her ex-lover.

opens in a new windowYou Let Me In opens in a new window by Camilla Bruce

“I have always been interested in folklore, and fascinated by previous generations’ vague distinction between the faeries and the dead,” says Camilla Bruce. “One of my favourite things about faeries is their elusiveness; it is hard to get a firm grip on just what – or where– they are.”

She’s talking about her inspiration for You Let Me In, a mystery of otherworldly thrills situated within a sinister domestic atmosphere.

It might seem a bit on the nose to read books about contagions right now, but what better than a book to give you hope that we’ll make it to the other side? Here are five books about contagions that plague worlds from our near past to our distant future, and the indomitability of humanity in building relationships of love and joy despite them.

By Yvonne Ye

opens in a new windowImmunity Index by Sue Burke

Orphan Black meets Contagion in Burke’s novel as three perfectly normal young women in Wisconsin, discover that they are all clones of each other. Meanwhile, the gifted scientist who made them races to find a cure for a rapidly-spreading virus while battling the cover-up that would conceal the virus’s sinister origins. Around them, the nation destabilizes in the face of disaster, food shortage, and a burgeoning fascist regime.

opens in a new windowSun-Daughters, Sea-Daughters by Aimee Ogden

What happens to the Little Mermaid after the fairytale ends? When a devastating plague strikes her husband and her adopted people, Atuale takes to the stars seeking a cure. In order to do so, however, she’ll need the help of Yanja, the powerful World-Witch, but it’s been twenty years and a vicious war since these childhood friends have seen each other last, and Yanja is no longer the person that Atuale once knew.

opens in a new windowThe Endless Skies by Shannon Price

Rowan has been training for her entire life to become one of the Leonodai, one of the famed winged-lion warriors who guard the floating city of the Heliana from the evils of the world of humans. But just before Rowan can take the oath and assume the mantle, a disease strikes the city’s children, forcing the Leonodai to depart for a dangerous mission seeking a cure in enemy lands. Meanwhile in Heliana, Rowan learns of a terrible secret—one that would force her to choose between becoming what she’d always dreamed of, and saving everyone she loves.

opens in a new windowStation Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

In Mandel’s intricate and lyrical novel, the world is ending, has already ended, or will end very soon as the Georgia Flu sweeps through the world, halting human civilization in its tracks. Twenty years after the epidemic, Kirsten Raymonde travels what was formerly known as the Midwest with the Travelling Symphony, performing Shakespeare after the apocalypse. When the members of the troupe begin to go missing, one by one, the Travelling Symphony strikes out for the “Museum of Civilization” on a journey that explores faith, family, and the importance of storytelling in a world recovering from disaster.

opens in a new windowI Am Legend by Richard Maltheson

No list about apocalyptic contagions would be complete without this title, which already has at least three film adaptations. After a viral plague causes all of humanity, both living and dead, to turn into vampiric creatures, former factory worker Robert Neville spends his days fending off vampires, scavenging to survive, and teaching himself virology to figure out exactly what caused the plague. The arrival of Ruth, the first human survivor he’s seen in three years, might change everything for the better—or bring it all crashing down.