Hello everyone!
I am back with another review, Fierce Fairytales: Poems and Stories to Stir Your Soul by Nikita Gill. Thanks so much to Hachette Book Group Canada for sending me a copy of this book for an honest review, as always, all opinions are my own.
This book is essentially a collection of poems - some short and some long - as well as a few longer pieces I would call very short stories. They cover not only fairytales but social issues as well. The fairytales all have a "fierce" feminist sort of twist, either with dismissing the necessity of a 'Prince Charming' or explaining why the logic that puts such a necessity on one is flawed. I also found it very refreshing to see not only feminist ideas but also those touching on more general social issues like eating disorders, toxic masculinity, being a refugee or immigrant, racial issues, and many more.
I don't think this will be a very long review because this is just not a very long book, but I will say that I found Gill's prose absolutely riveting. I found myself tabbing and underlining (I KNOW) lines of poems and full paragraphs. It's been a really long time since I've had the urge to do that to a book I wasn't reading for school and while I didn't want to "wreck" my book (which is another topic for a whole other discussion), I also couldn't resist doing it.
Not only did Gill take the typical fairytales and give them a feminist or more modern twist she also worked to explain characters that have been glossed over or labelled as purely evil to become a plot point. Evil stepmothers come from the anger of being heartbroken widows who see the beauty of their youth reflected back in a daughter they didn't ask for. Witches are made from women living alone, outside of society's allocated position for them. I found these stories and poems really interesting and fascinating takes on "villainesses."
Overall, this is a beautifully written and provocative collection of poetry and prose that you will definitely want to pick up.