Bingo square – Adapt/Camel – Classic retelling with characters adapting left and right
I love Alix E. Harrow. I read everything she writes and it is all pretty fantastic, including this one. But this series is annoying me because each novella is so short! Why is it not just one novel?? Ok so technically this is the second book in her Fractured Fables series, which is a great concept but it feels like the publisher is really milking it to make these all come out in hardcover. I mean, I love a good novella, but I prefer when it is a standalone story, not part of a series.
Ok so now that I have gotten to vent let me tell you that this little wee thing of a book is a wonderful new perspective on villains, heroes, and fairy tales all with a healthy dose of queer romance mixed in. BUT, you definitely need to read A Spindle Splintered first as it is very much a sequel.
So the gist of the series is that all the various versions of a single tale are layered on each other in an endless array of multiverses, but the same basic story is at the core of each tale. Harrow introduces us to a modern queer Sleeping Beauty name Zinna from our universe who gains the power to travel between these worlds and help her compatriots. Great, right? To tell you much more about what happens to Zinna in A Mirror Mended would be a bit of a spoiler so I will leave it at that, but I will say she ends up meeting some Snow Whites.
This book is definitely a must for anyone who grew up obsessed with reading the bloody and dark original versions of fairy tales.
