Laurie Thayer penned this review.
Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears is the third volume of reworked fairy tales brought to us by the editing team of Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling. As in their previous volumes, Snow White, Blood Red and Black Thorn, White Rose, these are tales meant for adult readers, not for children.
In this volume, the editors’ introduction concerns the literary history of fairy tales. The term “fairy tale” comes from the seventeenth century French term for tales that were popular not with children, but with educated, aristocratic adults. Many of the tales with which we are familiar were either invented at this time, or embellished from the oral tradition by French writers such as Charles Perrault and Marie-Catherine d’Aulnoy, and later passed back into the oral tradition. Some of these recycled stories, amusingly enough, were later collected by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm! Each century has had its own writers of literary fairy tales, all influenced by those who have gone before. If you are interested in investigating the field, the editors have, as before, included a recommended reading list at the end of the book.
In this third anthology appear stories by Tanith Lee, Joyce Carol Oates, Nancy Kress, Neil Gaiman and Jane Yolen, among others. The tales range from the comedic to the tragic, from high fantasy to science fiction, with many stops in between.
Among the stories is Nancy Kress’s “Summer Wind,” which is a retelling of “Sleeping Beauty.” In this rather heartbreaking version, the princess awakens early and alone from her long sleep; the rest of the castle slumbers on. She cannot leave, but she can hear and, from her tall tower, see the princes who try to get through the great briar hedge surrounding the castle.
Tanith Lee’s “The Beast,” like her earlier story “Snow-drop,” which appeared in Snow White, Blood Red, is set in a futuristic winterscape. When Isobel’s father finds that he is dying of cancer, he arranges a marriage for her to a wealthy collector of beautiful things. It is only after the marriage that Isobel discovers just how extensive her husband’s collection is. Normally, I don’t care for Lee’s writing, but the vivid imagery in these stories has stayed with me long after reading them.
“Roach in Loafers,” by Roberta Lannes, is a very amusing variant of the “Puss in Boots” tale. In this story, a Manhattan tailor finds help from a very unusual–and short–source.
Nancy A. Collins’ story, “Billy Fearless,” is based on the Grimms’ “A Tale About the Boy Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was”. In this story, Billy Fearless must spend three nights in a haunted house to earn a chest of gold. The results will make you laugh.
In “The Fox Wife,” by Ellen Steiber, young Haruko begins acting strangely soon after her unwanted marriage to Lord Ikeda. She claims that she is inhabited by a black vixen who is 120 years old. As her behavior becomes increasingly odd, her maidservant, O-Shima, begins to despair, fearing that her beloved Haruko will never again be well. This story originated in the medical records of a late nineteenth-century Japanese physician who treated many cases of kitsune (fox-spirit) possession.
Surprisingly, there was one story in this collection that did not seem to belong there: Joyce Carol Oates’s “The Crossing.” According to the editors, this was a version of “Sleeping Beauty”, but while it did have a woman in a coma, it did not seem to me to have any of the other traditional elements. I also found it personally distracting because Oates, who lives in upstate New York, mentions the Chautauqua Falls, a Chautauqua Mountain Range and a Chautauqua River. I live in the county next to New York’s Chautauqua County, and while there is a rather large lake there, there are no mountains or a river with a waterfall.
Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears brings together the work of twenty-two writers; the above are only a few examples of the outstanding stories to be found in this entire collection. Anyone interested in fairy tales, and the ways in which they change throughout time, will definitely want to pick up a copy of this marvelous anthology.
(Avon Books, 1995)
