Today Only Bargain Ebooks: Gaiman and FForde

Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman (Author), Brett Helquist (Illustrator)is $1.99 today in ebook format.

Book description:

In this inventive, short, yet perfectly formed novel inspired by traditional Norse mythology, Neil Gaiman takes readers on a wild and magical trip to the land of giants and gods and back.

In a village in ancient Norway lives a boy named Odd, and he's had some very bad luck: His father perished in a Viking expedition; a tree fell on and shattered his leg; the endless freezing winter is making villagers dangerously grumpy.

Out in the forest Odd encounters a bear, a fox, and an eagle—three creatures with a strange story to tell.

Now Odd is forced on a stranger journey than he had imagined—a journey to save Asgard, city of the gods, from the Frost Giants who have invaded it.

It's going to take a very special kind of twelve-year-old boy to outwit the Frost Giants, restore peace to the city of gods, and end the long winter.

Someone cheerful and infuriating and clever . . .

The Eyre Affair: A Thursday Next Novel by Jasper Fforde is $2.99 today only.

Book description:

The first installment in Jasper Fforde’s New York Times bestselling series of Thursday Next novels introduces literary detective Thursday Next and her alternate reality of literature-obsessed England

Fans of Douglas Adams and P. G. Wodehouse will love visiting Jasper Fforde's Great Britain, circa 1985, when time travel is routine, cloning is a reality (dodos are the resurrected pet of choice), and literature is taken very, very seriously: it’s a bibliophile’s dream. England is a virtual police state where an aunt can get lost (literally) in a Wordsworth poem and forging Byronic verse is a punishable offense. All this is business as usual for Thursday Next, renowned Special Operative in literary detection. But when someone begins kidnapping characters from works of literature and plucks Jane Eyre from the pages of Brontë's novel, Thursday is faced with the challenge of her career. Fforde's ingenious fantasy—enhanced by a Web site that re-creates the world of the novel—unites intrigue with English literature in a delightfully witty mix. Thursday’s zany investigations continue with six more bestselling Thursday Next novels, including One of Our Thursdays is Missing and the upcoming The Woman Who Died A Lot.

Jack, Giant, and Blackboard Jungle

I haven't watched the 1955 film, Blackboard Jungle, in decades. Then while I was puttering around the other night, John was watching it in the same room I was in for a few minutes. Wouldn't you know that of the few scenes I saw, one was a classroom discussion of Jack and the Beanstalk? I couldn't find a clip online, but it was an interesting usage about the ethics and reality of stories. And how fairy tales communicate to a large audience...

From TCM synopsis:

[The teacher] stimulates an animated class discussion by showing a "Jack and the Beanstalk" cartoon in class. Summarizing the discussion, Dadier encourages the young men to consider the real meaning of what they hear and to think for themselves.

From Subzin, which also provides the time stamp in the movie for when the Jack and the Beanstalk takes place:

01:15:40 -Teach, how about some more stories? -Yeah, a story about football.

01:15:43 Hey, teach. Maybe I'll turn out to be a critic on the movies.

01:15:47 How did you like Jack and the Beanstalk? Turned out to be a thief.

01:15:50 I liked the story.

01:15:56 -So you finally got through to them. -I think so.

The film is slated to air on TCM again on MONDAY, JANUARY 21, 2013 @ 08:00 AM (ET).

Today Only Ebook Bargains

Today's Amazon Kindle Deals are in the Gold Box and include several romance novels for $1.99 each at Gold Box Deal of the Day: $1.99 Kindle Romances. Two of the books are faerie and mythology inspired with authors that have been featured here before, but with different titles bargain priced. Here goes:

The Iron King by Julie Kagawa

Meghan Chase has a secret destiny--one she could never have imagined...

Something has always felt slightly off in Meghan's life, ever since her father disappeared before her eyes when she was six. She has never quite fit in at school...or at home.

When a dark stranger begins watching her from afar, and her prankster best friend becomes strangely protective of her, Meghan senses that everything she's known is about to change.

But she could never have guessed the truth-- that she is the daughter of a mythical faery king and is a pawn in a deadly war. Now Meghan will learn just how far she'll go to save someone she cares about, to stop a mysterious evil no faery creature dare face...and to find love with a young prince who might rather see her dead than let her touch his icy heart.

The Goddess Test (Harlequin Teen) by Aimeé Carter

It's always been just Kate and her mom—and her mother is dying. Her last wish? To move back to her childhood home. So Kate's going to start at a new school with no friends, no other family and the fear her mother won't live past the fall.

Then she meets Henry. Dark. Tortured. And mesmerizing. He claims to be Hades, god of the Underworld—and if she accepts his bargain, he'll keep her mother alive while Kate tries to pass seven tests.

Kate is sure he's crazy—until she sees him bring a girl back from the dead. Now saving her mother seems crazily possible. If she succeeds, she'll become Henry's future bride, and a goddess.

Fairy Tale Tabs 12/27/2012

Janet and Anne Graham Johnstone

Read Guest post: Christie from Spinning Straw Into Gold on Little Match Girl at Tales of Faerie

I enjoyed All I Want For Christmas... at Doc in Boots. Hope some of the wishes are fulfilled.

I'm especially eager to read Fairy Tale Queens. There's a chapter, "The Queen's Wardrobe: Dressing the Part," which could have been written especially for me! Although I'm also intrigued by "The Fairest of Them All: Queenship and Beauty." Every chapter looks fascinating and I have high hopes.

Read On The Snow Queen, Part 2 at Spinning Straw into Gold:

Though the devil's mirror and the Snow Queen are not direct accomplices, their methods are similar. The glass shards make Kai blind to the living beauty of the roses and only able to appreciate the inorganic geometry of the snowflakes.

And also Snow White's Stepmother at Spinning Straw into Gold:

I never tire of reading about, writing about, and watching Snow White. That said, I'm late to viewing this 90's film, Snow White: A Tale of Terror, but I liked it.

It's grounded in a historical medieval Europe (there is mention of Paris and the Black Plague) and earned its title with suitably nightmarish scenes and plot details. There's definitely the elements of a horror film at work. Not to mention, A Tale of Terror preceded the dark fairy tale remakes now in vogue over a decade later. Think Red Riding Hood, The Brothers Grimm, and Snow White and the Huntsman.

Grimm: Season One is $16.99

Grimm: Season One is $16.99 in DVD format at Amazon and Target for the rest of this week.

The Target ad also shows Once Upon a Time: The Complete First Season as $16.99 but it is not listed on the Target site, so Amazon is not price matching, at least not yet. So if you have a gift certificate to either place and didn't get these on your wishlist, these are the lowest prices to date on these sets.

Fairy Tale Gifts 2012: Jenna

Our next entry in the Fairy Tale Gifts 2012 Giveaway is from Jenna:

1.) The Annotated Brothers Grimm (The Bicentennial Edition) edited & translated by Maria Tatar. Though I have the previous edition, I can't resist also wanting this new one for the expanded content.

2.) The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault (Calla Editions) illustrated by Harry Clarke. These Calla Editions look gorgeous!

3.) Off with Their Heads! Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood by Maria Tatar. I think I side with Tatar over Bettelheim and have been wanting to read this one for a while.

4.) Italian Folktales by Italo Calvino. I am not familiar any Italian folktales and I must correct this. (From Heidi: I should do a series of posts on Italian folktales. This is a WONDERFUL book, but not necessarily the place to start with Italian folklore. And Calvino, like so many, rewrote tales, too. The tales in this collection are "hybrids" as discussed in the introduction. I'm not picky that way, it's all literary to me once it is written down. Then again, it could be a starting point if you want to start with well-written tales and then work backwards to Calvino's source materials. I'm going to stop now and avoid the temptation of deleting this gloss altogether. In the end, this book is highly recommended and sits on my shelf but I don't take it down nearly as often as others.)

5.) The Complete Fairy Tales (Penguin Classics) by George MacDonald. I had never heard of him until I stumbled upon his tale "The Light Princess," and now I must read the rest of his fairy tales!

(From Heidi: Two wishlists included George MacDonald collections. While all of his books are available for free reading online, I understand the desire for a paper copy. I'd like to recommend finding editions of MacDonald's most popular tales illustrated by Maurice Sendak, and others, such as The Golden Key (A Sunburst Book) and The Light Princess (Sunburst Book).