Dixit and Fairy Tales

Amazon's Deal of the Day is save 40% or more on select strategy games. While there are several worthy games in the sale, I would like to HIGHLY recommend my personal favorite, Dixit. The game is usually about $36 and today is $18.99. I'm picking up a new set as a gift. It'll be the third time I've bought this set--my second gift copy.

Dixit has become the family favorite in my house and wins as the board game I have played the most times this year since we tried it out over the winter holidays. My parents (officially senior citizens) and my nephew and niece (ages 9 & 11) love it. We played it at least once a week all summer and during every visit during the year. It's Balderdash with images--strangely wonderful images. You have a handful of 7 cards with intriguing illustrations. Someone comes up with a phrase or metaphor for a card in their hand, then they share the phrase with the group. The group hands over a card from each of their hands which best suits the phrase. Then everyone tries to guess which is the correct card. You get points if you guess correctly and more if someone else chooses your decoy card. You also get points if part of the group, but not all or none, correctly chooses your own card when you choose the phrase, so you are rewarded for being vague but not too oblique. You have to find that balance.

That said, I think it plays best when you have a group comfortable enough to know each other and be a little silly, perhaps have a few in-jokes, like a family or close group of friends or a mix up there of. I tried it with a group of non-related teenagers who liked it and kept playing it, but they weren't comfortable enough with each other to reach the level of fun I have had playing it with family and friends.

I make it sound like my family plays lots of board games--not really, we spend just as much time playing Just Dance and other games on the Xbox 360 Kinect and not playing board games at all. But this one stuck and the kids kept wanting to play it and the adults enjoyed it, too, so it became a regular event and I ended up buying all the expansion packs over the past year to keep adding to the fun.

And while I can justify posting about Dixit because I love it and hey, it's my blog! I also can share that some of those cards have fairy tale themes to them which is always a jolt of fun--there is an average of a few cards in each set that invoke a well-known fairy tale. This sale set doesn't have as many but it is still my favorite because the illustrations are charming and work well. The images I've shared here are all from that set.

One expansion set--I can't remember which one--was a definite least favorite although we enjoyed it, too. Just not as much. It was harder to get an imaginative scope with it. Another set is darker in tone than the others, but I just can't remember which set was which. I've kept them separate so I'll have to thumb through them sometime. But not this sleepless morning.

New Book: As Red as Blood (The Snow White Trilogy) by Salla Simukka

As Red as Blood (The Snow White Trilogy) by Salla Simukka (Author), Owen Witesman (Translator), the first book in a trilogy, was released this month in the U.S. The series is inspired by both fairy tales--Snow White--and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. So if you like both, this book may interest you. It is marketed as YA (young adult) but it is gritty, dark, etc. to the point that some are protesting that marketing choice. The reviews are all over the board for this one for that reason. Lumikki, by the way, is Finnish for "Snow White."

Book description:

In the midst of the freezing Arctic winter, seventeen-year-old Lumikki Andersson walks into her school’s dark room and finds a stash of wet, crimson-colored money. Thousands of Euros left to dry—splattered with someone’s blood.

Lumikki lives alone in a studio apartment far from her parents and the past she left behind. She transferred into a prestigious art school, and she’s singularly focused on studying and graduating. Lumikki ignores the cliques, the gossip, and the parties held by the school’s most popular and beautiful boys and girls.

But finding the blood-stained money changes everything. Suddenly, Lumikki is swept into a whirlpool of events as she finds herself helping to trace the origins of the money. Events turn even more deadly when evidence points to dirty cops and a notorious drug kingpin best known for the brutality with which he runs his business.

As Lumikki loses control of her carefully constructed world, she discovers that she’s been blind to the forces swirling around her—and she’s running out of time to set them right. When she sees the stark red of blood on snow, it may be too late to save her friends or herself.

About the Author
Winner of the 2013 Topelius prize, Salla Simukka is an author of young adult fiction and a screenwriter. She has written several novels and one collection of short stories for young readers, and has translated adult fiction, children’s books, and plays. She writes book reviews for several Finnish newspapers and she also writes for TV. Simukka lives in Tampere, Finland.

Fairy Tale Highlights of the American Folklore Society's 2014 Annual Meeting

The American Folklore Society's Annual Meeting is coming soon and the deadline to register at a discounted rate is August 31st. The Society's 2014 annual meeting will be held November 5-8 at the Santa Fe Convention Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico. My own attendance is still undecided but I highly recommend attending as well as becoming a member of AFS if you are not already.

I've pulled the fairy tale related papers from the 56 page program. There is always plenty to hear and see at the meeting but highlighting fairy tale discussions is SurLaLune's purpose. Looking through the papers, you can see a definite influence of ABC's Once Upon a Time and others on the current scholarship. I REALLY want to hear these papers, too, so now I get to see if the personal budget and schedule will accommodate me!

01-05
Channeling Wonder I: Televising Fairy-Tale Genders
Sponsored by the Folk Narrative Section and the Women's Section
See also 02-05

Claudia M. Schwabe (Utah State University), chair
8:00 Kirstian Lezubski (University of Winnipeg), The Power to Revolutionize the World, or
Absolute Gender Apocalypse? Queering the New Fairy-Tale Feminine in Revolutionary Girl Utena
8:30 Shuli Barzilai (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Catherine Breillat's Rescripting of
Charles Perrault's "Bluebeard"
9:00 Brittany Warman (The Ohio State University), Hearing Her Song: Examining (Feminist?)
Messages in the "Briar Rose" Episode of the Japanese Anime Grimms' Fairy Tale Classics
9:30 Patricia Sawin (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill), Things Walt Disney Didn't Tell
Us (But at Which Rodgers and Hammerstein at Least Hinted): The 1965 Made-for-TV Musical
Cinderella

02-05
Channeling Wonder II: Fairy-Tale (Un)Realities on Television
Sponsored by the Folk Narrative Section
See also 01-05

Pauline Greenhill (University of Winnipeg), chair
10:15 Jodi McDavid (Cape Breton University), Worlds Within Worlds: Depicting Fairy-tale
Superheroes in Children's Television
10:45 John Rieder (University of Hawai‘i, Manoa), The Fairy Tale and the Commercial:
Fractured Fairy Tales
11:15 Claudia M. Schwabe (Utah State University), Magic Realism in Grimm and Once Upon a
Time
11:45 Cristina Bacchilega (University of Hawai‘i, Manoa), The Fairy Tale and the Commercial:
The Italian Carosello

04-02
At the Crossroads of Folk Narrative, TV, and Gender

Jeana S. Jorgensen (Butler University), chair
8:00 Kim Snowden (University of British Columbia), "What's In the Basket Little Girl?":
Reading Buffy as Little Red Riding Hood
8:30 Linda Lee (University of Pennsylvania), Rehabilitating the Child-Stealing Witch:
Motherhood and Magic in ABC's Once Upon a Time
9:00 Jeana S. Jorgensen (Butler University), Gendering Lost Girl: Transforming Fairy-Tale and
Legend Intertexts in TV
9:30 Cristina Bacchilega (University of Hawai‘i), discussant

04-06
Theory II

Shandi Lynne Wagner (Wayne State University), chair
8:00 Anne Arundel Locker-Thaddeus (Texas A&M University), Comparison in a Crowded
Field: Choosing a Folk Narrative Analysis Technique
8:30 John Laudun (University of Louisiana), Counting Tales: Towards a Computational Model
of Narrative
9:00 Valdimar Tr. Hafstein (University of Iceland), Andersen and the Grimms: Authors,
Editors, Folk
9:30 Shandi Lynne Wagner (Wayne State University), The Intersection of Folklore and Fairy
Tale in the Ghostly Little Red Riding Hood of Elizabeth Gaskell's "Curious, If True" (1860)

06-07
New Scholarship on German and Russian Folk-Tale Studies

Jeanmarie Rouhier-Willoughby (University of Kentucky) and Linda Worley (University of
Kentucky), chairs
2:00 Ann Schmiesing (University of Colorado, Boulder), Disability and Able-Bodiedness in the
Grimms' Fairy Tales
2:20 Veronica Muskheli (University of Washington, Seattle), Unsettling Representation of the
Forest in Northern Russian Memorates
2:40 Zora Kadyrbekova (McGill University), Human-Animal Relationships in Russian Fairy
Tales
3:00 Qinna Shen (Miami University of Ohio), Little "Red" Riding Hood and Soviet Influence on
DEFA Fairy-Tale Films
3:20 Izabela Zdun (McGill University), The Fairy Tale Genre in Lyudmila Petrushevskaya's
Works: The Interplay between Literature and Folklore

06-13
Shakespeare and Spenser: Early Modern Adaptations of Folklore
Sponsored by the Medieval and Early Modern Folklore Section

Kerry Kaleba (independent), chair
2:00 Charlotte Artese (Agnes Scott College), "Like the Old Tale": Shakespeare as Folktale
Adapter
2:30 Sara Cleto (The Ohio State University), "Love, and Be Silent": Fairy Tale Conventions in
Shakespeare's King Lear
3:00 Joshua Commander (California State University, Stanislaus), The Hollow Christ, His
Brittle Glory, and His Sour Cross : An Examination of The Hollow Crown's Representation of
Shakespeare's Richard of Bordeaux as a Counterfeit of Christ
3:30 Amber N. Slaven (University of Louisiana, Lafayette), Continually at the Crossroads? The
Overlapping Liminality of Redcrosse Knight as a Fairy Changeling

08-17
Remapping 19th-Century Fairy Tales

Jennifer Schacker (University of Guelph), chair
10:15 Nancy Canepa (Dartmouth College), The Many Lives of Giambattista Basile's Neapolitan
Cunto
10:45 Christine A. Jones (University of Utah), Victorian Perrault, or the Birth of a Fairy
Godfather
11:15 Molly Clark Hillard (University of Seattle), Fairy Tales and Revolutions: Charles
Dickens's Bleak House
11:45 Jennifer Schacker (University of Guelph), Stage Folk: T. Crofton Croker's "Daniel O'
Rourke" at the Crossroads of Scholarship and Popular Culture

09-06
Diamond Session: At the Crossroads of Tales and Computers: Visualizing Fairy-Tale
Wonder through Filmographies and Computational Folkloristics

Jill T. Rudy (Brigham Young University), chair
2:00 Pauline Greenhill (University of Winnipeg), The International Fairy-Tale Filmography
(IFTF): Collaborating to Create a Digital Humanities Research Resource
2:10 Kendra Magnus-Johnston (University of Manitoba), Fairy Tales on TV: Archival
Methodologies for a Fairy-tale Teleography
2:20 Jill T. Rudy (Brigham Young University), Visualizing Fairy Tales on Television, or,
Everything Old is ATU Again
2:30 Madeleine Dresden (Brigham Young University), Glass Slippers and Small Screens: Rags
to Riches and the American Dream
2:40 discussion
3:00 Megan Armknecht (Brigham Young University), "Fractured Fairy Tales" and Rocky and
Bullwinkle for a Cold War Generation
3:10 Jessie Riddle (Brigham Young University), Red Hoods and Gold Locks: Motifs and Mash
Ups in Fairy-Tale Land
3:20 Kristy Stewart (Brigham Young University), Lost in the Genres: Hansel and Gretel across
TV Production Types

New Book: Charlie Glass's Slippers: A Very Modern Fairy Tale by Holly McQueen

Charlie Glass's Slippers: A Very Modern Fairy Tale by Holly McQueen was released last week. It is technically a reprint of a book published last year in the UK as The Surprising Life of Charlie Glass (size 18 and a Bit) which apparently didn't sell well enough and has earned a retitle and cover change for both the US and new UK edition--the same new title and cover in both countries, that is.

It's obvious the Cinderella inspiration was always present, but the marketing didn't play it up obviously enough with more of a Meg Cabot vibe for the cover instead. Fairy tales sell products, didn't you know? If your product was inspired by them, don't hide it! That said, it looks like a fun romp in women's fun fiction--I hate to use "chic lit" since it is a derogatory term so often now and I don't like to denigrate literature women read for fun. Although I don't mind chic lit or scifi as a description, it's the intent behind the way other people use it that matters.

Book description:

In this delightful, clever spin on Cinderella, Charlie Glass—a heroine as loveable as Cannie Shapiro and Bridget Jones—inherits her father’s shoe empire and snatches up a drop-dead-gorgeous, multi-millionaire Prince Charming. But is he truly the key to her happily ever after?

When Charlie’s beloved father, iconic shoe designer Elroy Glass, dies after a long illness, everyone expects that he’ll leave his business to his glamorous wife and eldest daughters. After all, they’ve been running the company for years. But Elroy surprises everyone from beyond the grave: at the will reading, it’s announced that his fashion empire has been left to Charlie, his youngest—and plumpest—daughter.

Before she can run the company, Charlie decides she needs to make a few changes in her life. After several weeks at a California boot camp, she returns to London a new woman: thinner, blonder, and ready to revitalize the Elroy Glass brand. But as she’ll soon discover, a good esthetician and a killer pair of stilettos can only go so far, and there’s more to reinvention—and running a fashion empire—than meets the eye.

Endlessly entertaining, surprising, and ultimately inspiring, Charlie Glass’s Slippers is a modern-day fairytale about finding your own magic and transforming yourself from within.

New Baba Yaga Series by Deborah Blake

Wickedly Magical (A Baba Yaga Novella) by Deborah Blake is a novella introducing a new paranormal romance series about witches, all known as Baba Yagas. The brief descriptions look like the Baba Yaga of folklore is being referenced with some extras like Selkies. One of the witches travels in her airplane--the modern rendition of a hut on chicken legs popularized by Orson Scott Card with his Baba Yaga in his Enchantment.

Book description:

Known as the wicked witch of Russian fairy tales, Baba Yaga is not one woman, but rather a title carried by a chosen few. They keep the balance of nature and guard the borders of our world, but don’t make the mistake of crossing one…

Barbara Yager loves being one of the most powerful witches in the world, but sometimes she’d rather kick back in her enchanted Airstream with a beer in her hand than work out how to grant the requests of the worthy few who seek her out.

But when a man appears with the token of a family debt of honor, Barbara must drop everything to satisfy the promise owed by her predecessor—and she isn’t above being a little wicked to make sure the debt is paid in full…

Deborah Blake has published seven books on modern witchcraft with Llewellyn Worldwide and has an ongoing column in Witches & Pagans Magazine. When not writing, Deborah runs The Artisans’ Guild, a cooperative shop she founded with a friend in 1999, and also works as a jewelry maker, tarot reader, and energy healer. She lives in a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural upstate New York with five cats who supervise all her activities, both magical and mundane.

Wickedly Dangerous (A Baba Yaga Novel) is the first book in the series--not a novella--and will be released on September 2, 2014.

Book description:

Older than she looks and powerful beyond measure, Barbara Yager no longer has much in common with the mortal life she left behind long ago. Posing as an herbalist and researcher, she travels the country with her faithful (mostly) dragon-turned-dog in an enchanted Airstream, fulfilling her duties as a Baba Yaga and avoiding any possibility of human attachment.

But when she is summoned to find a missing child, Barbara suddenly finds herself caught up in a web of deceit and an unexpected attraction to the charming but frustrating Sheriff Liam McClellan.

Now, as Barbara fights both human enemies and Otherworld creatures to save the lives of three innocent children, she discovers that her most difficult battle may be with her own heart…

Wickedly Wonderful (A Baba Yaga Novel) will be released in December.

Book description:

Known as the wicked witch of Russian fairy tales, Baba Yaga is not one woman, but rather a title carried by a chosen few. They keep the balance of nature and guard the borders of our world, but don’t make the mistake of crossing one of them…

Though she looks like a typical California surfer girl, Beka Yancy is in fact a powerful yet inexperienced witch who’s struggling with her duties as a Baba Yaga. Luckily she has her faithful dragon-turned-dog for moral support, especially when faced with her biggest job yet…

A mysterious toxin is driving the Selkie and Mer from their homes deep in the trenches of Monterey Bay. To investigate, Beka buys her way onto the boat of Marcus Dermott, a battle-scarred former U.S. Marine, and his ailing fisherman father.

While diving for clues, Beka drives Marcus crazy with her flaky New Age ideas and dazzling blue eyes. She thinks he’s rigid and cranky (and way too attractive). Meanwhile, a charming Selkie prince has plans that include Beka. Only by trusting her powers can Beka save the underwater races, pick the right man, and choose the path she’ll follow for the rest of her life…

Fairy Tale & Folklore Ebook Bargains in Amazon's Big Deal Sale

There is a new ebook sale at Amazon: The Big Deal: Kindle Books Up to 85% Off: Now through August 24, 2014, save up to 85% on more than 400 Kindle books.. There are a few books that SurLaLune readers will be interested in on the list. And it's a budget buster list overall. So here I share!

Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George is $1.99. An East of the Sun and West of the Moon retelling.

Book description:

Blessed-or cursed-with an ability to understand animals, the Lass (as she's known to her family) has always been an oddball. And when an isbjorn (polar bear) seeks her out, and promises that her family will become rich if only the Lass will accompany him to his castle, she doesn't hesitate. But the bear is not what he seems, nor is his castle, which is made of ice and inhabited by a silent staff of servants. Only a grueling journey on the backs of the four winds will reveal the truth: the bear is really a prince who's been enchanted by a troll queen, and the Lass must come up with a way to free him before he's forced to marry a troll princess.

The Wisdom of the Myths: How Greek Mythology Can Change Your Life by Luc Ferry is $1.99.

Book description:

More than 100,000 copies sold in France

A fascinating new journey through Greek mythology that explains the myths' timeless lessons and meaning

Heroes, gods, and mortals. The Greek myths are the founding narratives of Western civilization: to understand them is to know the origins of philosophy, literature, art, science, law, and more. Indeed, as Luc Ferry shows in this masterful book, they remain a great store of wisdom, as relevant to our lives today as ever before. No mere legends or clichés ("Herculean task," "Pandora's box," "Achilles heel," etc.), these classic stories offer profound and manifold lessons, providing the first sustained attempt to answer fundamental human questions concerning "the good life," the burden of mortality, and how to find one's place in the world. Vividly retelling the great tales of mythology and illuminating fresh new ways of understanding them, The Wisdom of the Myths will enlighten readers of all ages.

Magic Under Glass by Jaclyn Dolamore is $1.99.

Book description:

Nimira is a foreign music-hall girl forced to dance for pennies. When wealthy sorcerer Hollin Parry hires her to sing with a piano-playing automaton, Nimira believes it is the start of a new and better life. In Parry's world, however, buried secrets are beginning to stir. Unsettling below-stairs rumors swirl about ghosts, a madwoman roaming the halls, and Parry's involvement with a league of sorcerers who torture fairies for sport. Then Nimira discovers the spirit of a fairy gentleman named Erris is trapped inside the clockwork automaton, waiting for someone to break his curse. The two fall into a love that seems hopeless, and breaking the curse becomes a race against time, as not just their love, but the fate of the entire magical world may be in peril.Look out for the follow-up to this book, Magic Under Stone, out next year!

The Wild Girls (Outspoken Authors) by Ursula K. LeGuin is a novella for $.99.

Book description:

Newly revised and presented here in book form for the first time, this Nebula Award-winning story tells of two captive "dirt children" in a society of sword and silk, whose determination to find a glimpse of justice leads to a violent and loving end. Also included is the nonfiction essay "Staying Awake While We Read" which demolishes the pretensions of corporate publishing and the basic assumptions of capitalism, and "Outspoken Author Interview," which reveals the hidden dimensions of America's best-known sci-fi author.

Robin Hood: People's Outlaw and Forest Hero: A Graphic Guide by Paul Buhle (Author), Chris Hutchinson (Illustrator) is $.99.

Book description:

Using a unique blend of text, collage, and comic art, this social commentary written in graphic novel format analyzes the continuity between the myth of Robin Hood and the occurrence of social uprisings among peasants. In addition, the book explores the mysteries, factual evidence, and trajectory that led to centuries of village festivals, songs, films, and cult television shows about the mythical hero who robbed from the rich and gave to the poor. Featuring a collage of various artistic renderings of Robin Hood over the past seven centuries, the comic portion presents a distinct perspective of the folk hero. Furthermore, the book reveals a largely unknown and unconsidered environmental side of Robin Hood, and touches on ecological wholeness that, for the most part, is absent in the mythos.

Newt's Emerald by Garth Nix is $1.99 and has been on my wishlist. No fairy tales here, just a fun Regency historical adventure fantasy novel for YA and adults.

Book description:

After the Newington Emerald is stolen at the height of a conjured storm, eighteen year-old Lady Truthful Newington goes to London to search for the magical heirloom of her house. But as no well-bred young lady can hunt the metropolis for a stolen jewel, she has to disguise herself as a man, and is soon caught up in a dangerous adventure where she must risk her life, her reputation . . . and her heart.

Balancing twin roles as a young lady coming out in her first season and as an intrepid young man up against an evil sorceress isn’t easy, but Truthful has to manage it. Her father’s life and even the fate of England may depend upon her recovering the Newington Emerald!

A Regency Romance with Magic from New York Times-bestselling writer Garth Nix, author of Sabriel.

New Book: The Twelve Dancing Princesses (Little Golden Book)

My post sharing The Wild Swans Little Golden Book has been a popular post this week. So I realized I should share The Twelve Dancing Princesses (Little Golden Book) by Jane Werner and illustrated by Sheilah Beckett, a reprint of a classic Little Golden Book, reprinted earlier this year. I didn't own this one as a child either but I wish I had. I didn't learn about this fairy tale until I was older than the typical Little Golden Book reader. I've always felt a little cheated by that because I know it would have been one of my instant favorites just with the dancing element alone--I wasn't princess oriented but I was VERY dance obsessed-- and it would have flavored my childhood.

What I like about this one is how each sister appears to have a unique personality in the illustrations. I would have spent hours imagining each of their personalities once upon a time.

Book description:

This beloved fairy tale about the princesses who secretly dance their slippers into pieces each night is brought to life in this dazzling Little Golden Book from 1954. Breathtaking illustrations by the inimitable Sheilah Beckett have been digitally restored to their original splendor.