Once Upon a Time: New Fairy Tales Paperback

When they grow older, I decided long ago—as the days, months,

and years come to pass—I will tell them a different story. A story with a good moral of its own to benefit them when they are ready. I will tell them everything they need to know about this world to find or make their happy endings. And if the world cannot provide them with the love they require for happiness, I will tell them to leave it, to join another if one is ever offered. I will tell them to not go back up the path to what they already know. Eat, drink, love without caution.

Within this world’s fierce embrace, they need not struggle so.

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Christopher Barzak is the author of the Crawford Fantasy Award-winning novel, One for Sorrow, which is currently being made into the feature film Jamie Marks is Dead. His second book, The Love We Share Without Knowing, was a finalist for the Nebula and Tiptree Awards.

His short fiction has appeared in a variety of venues, including

Asimov’s Science Fiction, Realms of Fantasy, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, and several “year’s best” anthologies His most recent books are Birds and Birthdays, a collection of surrealist fantasy stories, and Before and Afterlives, a collection of supernatural fantasies. He grew up in rural Ohio, has lived in California and Michigan, and has taught English in suburban and rural communities outside of Tokyo, Japan. Currently he teaches at Youngstown State University.

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“The Mirror Tells All” was inspired during a lecture at a

fairy tale conference I attended in which “Snow White”

was described as a story about mother-daughter competition. My

immediately reaction was, yes, but what if it isn’t? The voice of a young woman flitted through my mind, a young woman with a different interpretation. That is the beauty of fairy tales—they can be read in any number of ways, and the meanings that can be culled from them are as relevant now as they were when the stories were

first written. For me, “Little Snow White” is a story of triumph in the face of those who would, by envy or other means, try to stifle a young woman’s spirit.

Erzebet Yellowboy

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The Mirror Tells All


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Erzebet YellowBoy


Listen. Here’s the story you wouldn’t let me tell.

I know, I know. You’re dying. Leave you to it. Let you rest in peace. You’ll have all the peace you need, in a day or two. That’s what the doctor told me, anyway. Did he tell you that? No? Oh well. I’m sure he’ll get around to it eventually.

I read somewhere the other day that this story is about competition.

Daughters growing up, mothers growing old, that sort of thing. I don’t buy it. There was never any of that stuff between us. No, this is a story about love, not competition. Maybe if you’d pried your face away from that mirror . . . Nah. You didn’t. So that’s where this story begins.

I tried to break that thing once, did you know? I saw you go into the bathroom and I seized the moment. I threw your silver hairbrush at that mirror with all the power in my scrawny little arm. I hurled it so hard! Nothing. Not a scratch. The damned hairbrush bounced off like it’d hit rubber. Boing. Nearly came back to smack me in the eye. I thought about taking a hammer to it, but by then you’d locked up all of Dad’s tools in the shed out back, and I couldn’t find the key.

So. The story. There was this woman who couldn’t stop looking at herself in the mirror. That’s you, that is. Thought I’d better spell it out. This woman had everything a woman could ever want: a loving husband, more money in the bank than she could ever spend, more clothes in the closet than she could ever wear, a fantastic stone house ? 323 ?