At Midnight: 15 Beloved Fairy Tales Reimagined

The original source tales are included at the end of the book for comparison and further entertainment, giving you double the stories to enjoy.The writing in the new stories is less formulaic and much more literary or descriptive than their classic source material and the characters include influencers, hackers/coders and teen hunters along with monsters of all ages and types.Each story in the collection has its own distinct flavour and style – Phoenix Ashes’ escape in Alex London’s ‘HEA’ is a glamorous queer love story, whereas the performance of the Silent Sisters in Melissa Albert’s ‘The Sister Switch’ is nightmarish horror and Rebecca Podos’ ‘A Story About a Girl’ is a mixture of classic horror movies with Scheherazade-style stalling.All of the stories are, however, very clever and well-written and there wasn’t a single one that I didn’t find entertaining – there is genuinely something for everyone here. I heartily recommend this collection to (adult) fans of fairy tales old and new.

For anyone who loves the fairy tales of old and fairy tales of new; this book is perfect for you, it has fifteen original fairy tales plus diverse retellings that the authors have done an amazing job of. They’ve made the stories their own whilst still retaining what the original fairy tale is all about.There are so many excellent ones in Thai collection of fairy tales but for me the main stand outs were undoubtedly the Snow White retelling, Mother’s Mirror by H.E. Edgmon and Once Bitten, Twice Shy by Hafsah Faizal, a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood.Mother’s Mirror by H.E. Edgmon is all about how she doesn’t want to be a girl, the author through her character gives her thoughts on how she feels about doing girly things which I thought was really thought provoking. It’s all about the journey that someone who is a transgender goes on and how her mother feels about her child which I thought could really touching at times. It’s a very modern retelling about her journey and the acceptance of those all around her.Once Bitten, Twice Shy by Hafsah Faizal is mainly about her revenge on on a Wolf who dupes her but this one is also really thought provoking. The author uses her character’s voice to show how Muslim’s odds are stacked against them as someone who wears a hijab and how more walls are pitted against them as a Muslim but sadly is something that they are used to.The Emperor and the Eversong was another I loved as it featured a singing bird. Hea also had lots of great pop culture references and I loved how in the Little Mermaid retelling how they had Terpeople which were not like the typical representation of mermaids. Instead of a tail they had extra arms and can also change sex which I thought was cool.I got to discover some new old fairy tales and ones I knew of but never got to read. I discovered some new favourites like The Nightingale which swept me up into ancient China. Some of the fairy tales are quite short which is great if you want to delve into lots of ones by such as authors, The Grimms Brothers, Hans Christian Andersen. They still hold up well today and I still loved the ones I read years ago just as much.