“After Alice” by Gregory Maguire

I have always enjoyed stories for children. (Alice in Wonderland is no exception.) And I have read and reveled in a number of books by Gregory Maguire, all of which were unique retellings of beloved fairy tales. So it's no surprise that this book caught my eye. It didn't hurt that it has a great cover (I love the silhouette look, and the font is perfect, but it gets even better--it's hard to tell in the photo, but that's a vellum dust jacket over a map of Oxford). AND it was on sale for less than seven dollars! Can you say no-brainer? 

Unfortunately, the book wasn't amazing. It seemed like more of a Carroll rehash (albeit from the perspective of a new character, and with some additions to the cast) than I've come to expect from Maguire. It's the story of Ada, an acquaintance of Alice, who falls into Wonderland and experiences much of what Alice did, just one step behind her all the way. There were no real surprises, and nothing was new enough to feel clever. And (though I suppose I'm displaying my ignorance by admitting this) I don't understand where Siam went. (Trying to avoid spoilers while also recording my hunch for posterity: I suppose he suffered the fate that Ada and Alice narrowly escaped.) I just wish it were more clear how the three children ended up in their predicament. (No, I didn't miss the suggestion of how Ada ended up there, but what about Siam and Alice?) Nevermind that I'm fully aware I would probably be complaining about the insulting level of clarity, had the explanation been  more plain. 

I don't regret buying the book (it's so beautiful!) or reading it (it definitely wasn't horrible or boring) but the best news is that now I get to read something new! Sam bought me three magnificent  hardcovers for Christmas. My only problem now is trying to decide which to pick up first . . . 

"What-the-Dickens: The Story of a Rogue Tooth Fairy" by Gregory Maguire

My experience with Gregory Maguire has been somewhat hit-or-miss, but as it's been more hit than miss, I was happy to give What-the-Dickens a try when Lydia told me the Kindle version was selling for cheap.

I must say this story couldn't have been more different from the other tooth fairy book I read. It's also quite a departure for Maguire (judging by the three of his that I'm familiar with, anyway). It's a fairy tale without any Grimm elements and, really, a very mild story throughout.

It begins with shades of The Island at the End of the World. A small family group is isolated by an apocalyptic storm, and its effects are slowly revealed throughout the book. But the resemblance doesn't go any further than that.

The tooth fairy bit is worked in as a tale told by Gage, the adult in charge, to keep the minds of the children off of the frightening storm. The story he tells is imaginative, and it leaves the reader with a nice little "could it be true?" feeling. But if you know Maguire and you're looking for the weird, the wild, or the nasty, you won't find it here.

For what it is, it's a sweet little story. I bet Bookworm Child would love it.

Reading in Retrospect: "Mirror, Mirror" by Gregory Maguire

This was the second book I read by Gregory Maguire. It's definitely different. The story is based on that of Snow White, but I would call it more of an alternate history than a retelling of the fairy tale. In fact, when I read the "teaser" for Mirror Mirror which I found at the end of my copy of Wicked, I'm not sure I even realized it was supposed to be the Snow White story.

After reading Wicked and seeing how Maguire’s treatment of the Wicked Witch of the West portrayed Elfaba as more kindhearted than wicked, merely masquerading as a witch, and not even really from the west, I assumed that in Mirror Mirror the allegedly wicked queen would really be a tragically maligned figure while Snow White would be the truly wicked one. (And, in fact, until finishing Mirror Mirror I assumed that the ugly stepsisters of Maguire's Cinderella retelling would really be beautiful, sweet and kind, and Cinderella would be a mean and thoughtless harpy, but Mirror Mirror caused me to revise my expectations.) Maguire may have explored the theme of fairy tale retellings through several books, but his methods are by no means formulaic.

In Maguire's version of Snow White, displaced Spaniard Vicente de Nevada and his motherless daughter Bianca (get it? that's White) have a small but comfortable Italian holding in Montefiore. Bianca’s mother and the love of Vicente’s life, Maria Ines, had died in childbirth in approximately 1494. Seven years later, although the residents of Montefiore have managed to avoid the civil unrest that swirls around them, destruction is visiting them in the form of the Borgias, Cesare and his sister (and sometime lover) Lucrezia.

Cesare forces Vicente to depart from Montefiore on a quest to obtain the one remaining branch of the Tree of Knowledge, leaving Montefiore (and thus, Bianca) under Cesare’s control. Vicente is compelled to obey this demand as he owes the holding of Montefiore to the Borgias. Over the next five years, Lucrezia is overcome with jealousy as she realizes that Bianca has unwittingly and unwillingly caught the eye of Cesare, so Lucrezia pays a young hunter to take Bianca into the woods and kill her.

Of course the hunter cannot complete the evil deed, and instead releases Bianca into the forest, where she is found by a group of strange stone creatures that are slowly evolving into dwarves. (That's one of the more bizarre aspects of this story, of which I’m not absolutely sure I grasped the point.) Another odd part of the story is the way time seems to slow down for Bianca while she is with the dwarves. She lies in a sort of a coma for perhaps 6 years. There is really no explanation for this passage of time (no poison, no illness) other than the fact that the stony beings she is with have a different concept of time from humans; nor is there any good explanation for why she finally wakes up.

This book is definitely a departure from the Disney version. I am sure that in this case I prefer the original story. Some of Grimm’s fairy tales can be grisly (in the case of the original Snow White story, Disney doesn't tell us that the wicked queen salts, cooks, and eats what she believes to be Snow White's heart, or that while Snow White and her prince were living happily ever after, the queen was punished with dancing in red-hot shoes until she fell down dead), but Maguire's retelling went beyond grisly. It was corrupt and perverted (though I understand that for some of you that may be a draw rather than a deterrent).

One great thing about the way Maguire told the Snow White story was how he stirred in actual historical figures. The Borgias fascinate me in the mesmerizing way of a poisonous snake. I'm not sure I can think of a more conniving and infamous family in all of history. Though their presence in a fairy tale can't be historically accurate, I'm convinced the portrayal of their tendencies and personalities was.

My biggest complaint about the book is that odd dreamlike quality I was frequently frustrated by in my own creative writing assignments when I was in grade school. So often when I was required to write a story I had trouble making it sound concrete and realistic, as when something you think you understand inexplicably morphs into another thing, or perhaps even disappears entirely. Much of this book was plagued by a similar problem. It may sound intriguing, but I saw this as a weakness in my own writing, and when I recognize it in a book I can't help but view it as a flaw.

Reading in Retrospect: My favorite book by Gregory Maguire

By popular demand (or, well, because Kristi asked about it), this Nostalgia Post is about my favorite of the three Gregory Maguire books that I've read: Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister (in case you hadn't already gathered which book it was from the picture of the cover).

Here is a case where the blurbs do the book justice and don't talk it up more than it deserves. Take the quote attributed to the Nashville Tennessean: “A tale so movingly told that you will say at the end of the first reading, ‘It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book this good.’ ” Or from the Detroit Free Press: “An arresting hybrid of mystery, fairy tale, and historical novel...” And, further, with Booklist, saying, “Highly absorbing... Maguire’s precise, slightly archaic language... sweeps readers through this mysterious and fascinating story.”

This novel takes the original Cinderella fairy tale and styles it so that the entire story is completely plausible and could have actually happened in real life. There is absolutely no magic involved (though plenty of imagination and intrigue), but towards the end the Cinderella character (Clara) makes up some nonsense to appease her sleepwalking stepmother, using parts of the magic in the original story (the pumpkin coach, the fairy godmother).

The book opens with Margarethe and her two daughters traveling from England back to Holland where Margarethe was born. Margarethe’s husband Jack Fisher was killed by an angry mob in England and, having no family left there, Margarethe and her daughters, Iris (younger and incredibly plain) and Ruth (who is mentally somewhat slow, and physically large and ox-like), left Harwich to find Margarethe’s grandfather in Haarlem, using their last bit of money to pay for their passage. Of course, when they arrived, they found that the grandfather was dead and gone, leaving them to either beg for charity or find a job for Margarethe as quickly as possible. They managed to meet a charitable and somewhat eccentric painter named Luykas Schoonmaker, better known as the Master, who gives them a temporary position.

Not many days later a man named Heer van den Meer calls on the Master to inquire about a commission, and when he finds out that Iris speaks both Dutch and English and is about the same age as his daughter, he decides he wants Margarethe, Iris and Ruth in his household in order to teach English to, and be a companion for, his daughter. Van den Meer’s daughter Clara, though very beautiful, is quite reclusive and is not allowed outside the garden walls surrounding their house. It takes her a while to warm up to Iris but she finally does, in the best way she knows how.

An interesting slant to the story is the presence of a number of painters and others with creative talent. The book delves into the way things are seen with an artistic eye, which I found a curious coincidence, as right after I read this book I picked up My Name Is Asher Lev (which deals intensely with the same theme) for book club. Confessions also reminded me quite a bit of Tracy Chevalier's Girl with a Pearl Earring, if only for the Dutch setting and the painterly milieu. I think a reader who enjoyed one will also like the other.

I just found out today that Confessions was made into a movie in 2002. Apparently it was a pretty big flop, as netflix doesn't even list it. Even so, I kind of wish I could see for myself. Have you seen the movie, or even heard of it?

Reading in Retrospect: "Wicked" by Gregory Maguire

Rachel's post on "Wicked: The Musical" reminded me, as the Google homepage already had earlier, that today was the 71st anniversary of the release of the movie The Wizard of Oz. What better day to put up my Nostalgia Post about Gregory Maguire's book, Wicked? I can still squeeze it in, as it won't be tomorrow for 26 more minutes (in my time zone, anyway).

This book first caught my eye while I was browsing at Target, my home away from home. It was the end of a year of belt-tightening and I was on a small shopping spree. When I saw the book, I assumed it would be a back-story of the Wicked Witch of the West, neatly dovetailing with the book by L. Frank Baum (which I hadn't yet read at the time, but like any good American I was fairly familiar with the movie).

As I'm sure you all know by now, I was right about the back story bit, but I couldn’t have been more wrong about the dovetailing. This book took Baum’s story and turned it on its head. It was as if Baum’s book had been written from an entirely different perspective and he got it all wrong.

Of course the main difference is with the witch herself. Other than being green and having a somewhat prickly personality as a result of her skin color, the “Witch”, Elfaba, is really not wicked at all. She is different, and perhaps shunned, but she is actually kind-hearted and bent on social equality, not evil. She goes to college (or possibly more of a prep school) and has a circle of close friends, one of whom, unexpectedly, is the “good witch” Glinda mentioned in the original book and movie. Most surprising (to me) of all, Elfaba has a passionate love affair. Who would have thought?

Glinda is another character that appears quite differently in this book. She is written in Wicked as a silly vain snob, although she is not as flat as all that, undergoing growth and changes and actually befriending Elfaba. In the end it is indeterminate as to whether she is (either knowingly or not) an agent of evil, but the possibility is there. And speaking of Evil, The Wizard is It. He is enacting great change and revolution in the land of Oz, and not for the better. The entire population (except perhaps for Elfaba) is terrified of him and his henchmen, the Gale Force (ha ha) who sound more like Gestapo.

I love fairy tales and am drawn to retellings (although not the modern, politically correct ones for today's children. Someone has subtracted all of the frights and thrills, reforming evil rather than vanquishing it, and allowing everyone to live happily ever after whether they deserve it or not). I don't mind a bit when an old favorite is retold in a darker and more sinister manner. I must admit, though, that I could have lived without the creepy weirdness of the multi-species sex club with enforced audience participation.

Since reading Wicked, I have read two more books by Maguire. One of them was on the mediocre side (Mirror Mirror), but the other I loved and will probably post about at some point.