Even though I haven't read pretty much any of the stories that were reworked in this collection (the King of Elfland's Daughter, "the Monkey's Paw," and the traditional fairytales excepted) I still found the stories to be interesting enough on their own. There are definitely a few base stories that I should have read ages ago - looking at Rudyard Kipling and Edmund Spenser here - and I am surprised that I've never read Le Fanu's Carmilla, but this just serves to prompt me to go back to the classics more often and fill some of the gaps in my favourite genres. Even the stories that I wasn't fond of thematically, such as "That the Machine May Progress Eternally" (post-machine revolutionary sci fi is so not my thing), were well enough written that I wasn't tempted to skip them, which is really saying something on the part of the editors' careful choice of authors. I may have not gotten a collection of reworked fairytales like I expected, but the results were still quite pleasing. Charles Vess' illustrations were also nice little treats scattered though out (and the main reason why I'm keeping this book), so even though they may not be actual short stories Vess' talents serve to prove that a picture really is worth 1000 words. ( )

This was a fantastic series of short stories, or retellings of various fairy/folktales, by some of my favorite teen writers. I'm really digging the whole short story collection format for the teen genre. It's a lot less angst to get through. ( )

As previously noted, I hate short stories. But there was a retelling of the Monkey's Paw, which meant I was in.

I skipped the stories that bored me, but I read more than half of them. I approve. ( )

A collection of short stories by famous and popular authors, each retelling, in his or her own way, a classic tale. ( )

This short story collection is an anthology of twelve retellings of fairy and otherwise classic twisted tales by American authors whose names were mostly unfamiliar to me, the exception being Neil Gaiman, who is a) British and b) a well-known author on these shores. The idea behind the collections sounds intriguing: each author was asked to contribute a retelling of a story which has influenced them in their life, with the inspirations ranging from Grimms’ tales of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ and ‘Rumpelstiltskin’ to Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s ‘Carmilla’ and Rudyard Kipling’s ‘The Man Who Would Be King’ to E. M. Forster’s ‘The Machine Stops’ and Edmund Spenser’s ‘The Faerie Queene’ - eclectic, to say the least, but this is half the attraction of the book. As a result, the stories on offer here defy categorisation, with settings in the far distant future, the present day, in fairy-tale land or in the past where people can be transported from one place to another by magic; the one thing they have in common though is generally a little twist that keeps the reader hooked. Not all the stories are successful, in my opinion, but there are more hits than misses, and some outstanding contributions, for example ‘Millcara’ by Holly Black, ‘That the Machine May Progress Eternally’ by Carrie Ryan, ‘The Sleeper and the Spindle’ by Neil Gaiman and ‘New Chicago’ by Kelley Armstrong; these are entertaining and thought-provoking in equal measure. At the end of each contribution the author in question offers a little insight into their creative mind and why a particular tale had been chosen as inspiration and into the creative mind of its author. I think everyone will find something to their liking here, and maybe even seek out some of the originals. The book is complemented by seven original drawings by the American illustrator Charles Vess, based on nowadays obscure but in his view groundbreaking books.

Make no mistake: when I saw the cover I thought this was a book for children, but the content of this book places it squarely into the adult fiction branch. Well worth a read.

(This review was originally written as part of Amazon's Vine programme.) ( )