Harrowing the Dragon (Once Upon a Time III #5 of 5)

This book looked intriguing to me because I loved Patricia McKillip's The Riddlemaster. Harrowing the Dragon is a collection of fifteen of McKillip's short stories. Fourteen of them follow a fantasy/fairy tale/magical type theme but one of them, about what happens after Romeo and Juliet die (entitled Star-Crossed) seemed a bit out of place. My favorites were "The Fellowship of the Dragon" and "The Lion and the Lark." I am always impressed by those who can tell a good short story. Somehow the author must find a way to make you care about the character in just a few pages and certainly the plot must unfold quickly. It was interesting reading this after having only read The RiddleMaster which was a HUGE book. McKillip is a talented storyteller.

Cybele's Secret (YA Romance Challenge #6 of 6, Once Upon a Time III #4 of 5)

I listened to Juliet Marillier's sequel to Wildwood Dancing and really quite liked it. Cybele's Secret features Paula (pronounced paola), the third of the five Transylvanian sisters featured in Wildwood Dancing, who is the scholar of the family. She accompanies her merchant father to Istanbul to do business there, particularly to acquire an ancient artifact known as Cybele's Gift. No one is sure exactly what it is, but there are several buyers including Duarte, the quite intersting Portugese ex-pirate. One of Paula's father's first tasks was to provide Paula with a bodyguard as the stakes of his interest in Cybele's Gift rise. Paula choses Stoyan, an apparently quite fine looking Bulgarian whose interest in protecting Paula quickly changes from duty to something more.

Paula was an interesting character. She repeatedly referred to herself as a scholar, and at seventeen this is a great aspiration. She also wanted to be a business woman and had to cope with being a woman in Istanbul which is truly a man's world. She is befriended by Irene who seems to have carved a niche for herself as a semi-independant (though married) woman who has a library and a life of her own. Paula was good mix of determination, resourcefulness, and bravery while at the same time being a bit too prudish for my liking. Along with the quest to find Cybele's gift, the supernatural came into play (continued from Wildwood Dancing) which spiced things up a bit. I have to say though, I had hoped the romance would heat up faster than it did. I mean, there was some good stuff in there and Paula having both the intellectual and wealthy Duarte and the protective Stoyan compete for her attention was fun. Still, I remember looking at my Ipod and thinking, if these two (I won't tell you which two!) don't get together in the next five minutes I'm gonna be irritated. And it turns out I was. Still, it was a fun listen.

Snow White and Rose Red (Once Upon a Time III #3 of 5)

I originally had this book as my last YA Romance books but before I could write my review I read a way better romance so I'll do that one instead. I like Patricia Wrede...I liked the Enchanted Forest Chronicles and the Sorcery and Cecelia books. This one was well written too...but the story didn't really capture me as other retold fairy tales have. It was a fairy tale I hadn't actually heard before, about two half mortal half faerie brothers who get into trouble (one of them is actually turned into a bear) and are helped out by two sisters. The tale is supposed to be set in a "magical Elizabethan England" but I didn't know enough about that time period for that historical setting to matter much. There was an interesting interplay of Christianity with Faerie and I did like that part. I wanted there to be more romance in the story than there was...my guess it that the lack of it was due to the historical setting. It wasn't a bad story certainly, but not one of my favorites.

Aurelie - A Faerie Tale (Once Upon a Time III #2 of 5)

When Loic the river drac rubbed his magic ointment into the eyes of his three human friends, Netta, Aurelie, and Garin, they were able to see the Fae - the dangerous creatures of the world ususally invisible. But the Fae do not want to be seen - and though the three promised to never tell, one of them broke that promise to save another and the consequence of that action changed all three of them.

Fast forward two years. Aurelie is the main focus of the story. She is the heir to the throne of Jocondagne, a country on the brink of war with Skoe, Garin's native country and current home. With Aurelie's mother dead, she must play a part in diplomatic negotiations with Skoe and the high ranking female officer named Jacinthe Inglis who has her sights on obtaining Jacondagne's throne through her son's marriage to Aurelie. Aurelie is not thrilled with this, her heart still belongs to Garin.

The story is told through three first person narrators (Garin, Loic, and Netta) and through a 3rd person narrator telling Aurelie's story. I read this in just a couple of hours and quite liked it. The characters were spunky and the plot moved quickly. A fun romance and a good original faerie tale.

The Innkeeper's Song (Jewish Literature Challenge # 3 of 4, Once Upon a Time III #1 of 5)

The Last Unicorn is one of the most beautiful and poetic books I've read. I LOVED it. Loved it. So I was thrilled when I found out that Peter Beagle has written other books. This fantasy seemed like it would be right up my alley and it was at first. Told through the eyes of several narrators (in the end I think it was too many narrators), three women: Lal, Nyateneri, and Lukassa to an inn run by an old crab named Karsh. Other important characters who also narrate include Marinesha and Rosseth (two teenage orphans who work at Karsh's inn), Tikat (who is following Lukassa), and the Fox who is a shape-shifter. That's the point of view of eight characters which I'm not saying inherently is a bad thing but I wasn't able to stay with it all the way through. Here is the Innkeeper's Song upon which the story is based:


There came three ladies at sundown:
One was brown as bread is brown,
One was black, with a sailor's sway,
And one was pale as the moon by day.

The white one wore an emerald ring,
The brown led a fox on a silver string,
And the black one carried a rosewood cane
With a sword inside, for I saw it plain.

They took my own room, they barred the door,
They sang songs I never had heard before.
My cheese and mutton they did destroy,
And they called for wine, and the stable boy.

And once they quarried and twice they cried —
Their laughter blazed through the countryside,
The ceiling shook and the plaster flew,
And the fox ate my pigeons, all but two.

They rode away with the morning sun,
The white like a queen, the black like a nun,
And the brown one singing with scarlet joy,
And I'll have to get a new stable boy.

I didn't quite love this book but I didn't dislike it. There was a very alarming sexual scene in the middle that seemed out of place in the book to me...something important was discovered becasue of it but it just seemed a bit gratuitious and it caught me completely off guard. But it was just that one random scene and that was it. There was some nice romance too though.

Once Upon a Time III

Oh fun! The Once Upon a Time Challenge II was the first book challenge I ever did so this new one looks massively fun. I am going to do Quest the First which is: Read at least 5 books that fit somewhere within the Once Upon a Time III criteria. They might all be fantasy, or folklore, or fairy tales, or mythology…or your five books might be a combination from the four genres. I am reading my first one now which is The Innkeeper's Song by Peter Beagle. I have so many other ideas. Here are just a few:

Aurelie by Heather Tomlinson
Skin Hunger by Kathleen Duey
Dragon Flight by Jessica Day George
Harrowing the Dragon by Patricia McKillip
Abhorsen by Garth Nix
One of a number of books by Sherwood Smith
The Last Dragon by Silvana de Meri
Snow White and Rose Red by Patricia Wrede