Showing posts with label award. Show all posts
Showing posts with label award. Show all posts

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"The Crane Wife" by Patrick Ness Named Notable Book by ALA

The Crane Wife by Katrina Pallon

I will admit I know very little about Patrick Ness, not having read any of his books, but Heidi has mentioned him on SurLaLune a couple of times so I thought I'd bring you notice of his latest folklore-based novel, especially since it was just named as one of ALA's Notable Books for 2015.

(And, as a bonus today I'm adding some lovely illustrations, some of which I hadn't seen before today. Credit is under each image.)
The Crane Wife by Kat Leyh
Refreshingly, this story is based on a little-known-to-the-Western-world romantic Japanese fairy tale (one of the better known ones that's usually included in multicultural collections) and was written by a man, both of which make it notable as well.
The Crame Wife by Janey-Jane

The Crane Wife is based on the fairy tale of the same name and seems to follow key aspects of the plot (at least to a certain point), though the setting is more urban and more modern.
The Crane Wife by Eno Keo

Two critically acclaimed authors who draw on folklore and fairy tales, Eowyn Ivy (The Snow Child) and Ali Shaw (The Girl With Glass Feet), both praise the book, which, despite other mixed reviews, is more than enough for me to put it in my shopping cart straight away!

Here's the synopsis, care of Penguin Press:
A magical novel, based on a Japanese folk tale, that imagines how the life of a broken-hearted man is transformed when he rescues an injured white crane that has landed in his backyard. 
George Duncan is an American living and working in London. At forty-eight, he owns a small print shop, is divorced, and is lonelier than he realizes. All of the women with whom he has relationships eventually leave him for being too nice.  
But one night he is waked by an astonishing sound—a terrific keening, which is coming from somewhere in his garden. When he investigates he finds a great white crane, a bird taller than himself. It has been shot through the wing with an arrow. Moved more than he can say, George struggles to take out the arrow from the bird’s wing, saving its life before it flies away into the night sky. 
The Crane Wife by pageboy
The next morning, a shaken George tries to go about his daily life, retreating to the back of his store and making cuttings from discarded books—a harmless personal hobby—when a woman walks through the front door of the shop. Her name is Kumiko, and she asks George to help her with her own artwork. George is dumbstruck by her beauty and her enigmatic nature and begins to fall desperately in love with her. She seems to hold the potential to change his entire life, if he could only get her to reveal the secret of who she is and why she has brought her artwork to him. 
The Crane Wife by Gennady Spirin (retold by Odds Bodkin)
 Witty, magical, and romantic, The Crane Wife is a story of passion and sacrifice that resonates on the level of dream and myth. It is a novel that celebrates the creative imagination and the disruptive power of love.

And here's the author introducing us to his novel:
Has anyone read this? I'm very curious now!

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"Bitter Greens" Wins American Library Association Prize for Best Historical Fiction 2015!


A huge congratulations to our fairy tale friend Kate Forsyth!

(Here's the official award listing from the ALA.)

From Kate's Facebook page a few hours ago:
Charlotte-Rose de la Force
Congratulations again Kate!
The award is well deserved.
*clinks glasses of champagne*
(And we can't wait to read what comes next!)

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And the Very Inspiring (Fairy Tale) Blogger Awards Go To...*drumroll*

Six Swans Triptych by Rovina Cai
It's awards season, and Once Upon A Blog just got handed a lovely Very Inspiring Blogger Award by lovely fantasy author, Katherine Harbour. Thank you Katherine!

Katherine Harbour is the author of the spellbinding novel Thorn Jack (a Tam Lin inspired tale) and, as a special bonus for OUABlog, has agreed to treating us to a guest chat in the near future, as we look forward to the paperback release of Thorn Jack and the upcoming sequel Briar Queen, (stay tuned!).

Today's award, however, is a way to spread love and appreciation for bloggers we are inspired by, as well as to give you a sneak peek behind the scenes of the people who write to make the blogosphere a good place to roam. To do this I get to share seven impossible things before breakfast.. wait, no seven things about me that maybe most of you don't know. Then I get to nominate up to fifteen bloggers to send you all to appreciate, who are then invited to do the same - pay it forward, pass the appreciation, and spread the awesome!

By the way, Katherine Harbour's intriguing list is HERE. (I am especially looking forward to our chat after reading it!)

So, seven things about me you might not know:

1) I love many, many of the aspects of the Alice In Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass stories and I love the merchandising (from Disney through to indie products), but the original books disturb me
2) Despite a bunch of good reasons to feel otherwise, I still love Disneyland
3) I wish I could read German fluently so I could read the original-text German editions of Household Tales, written by The Brothers Grimm
4) I rewrote The Six Swans for animated film, including storyboarding two sequences of it, long before I ever worked in animation (no has ever seen them, nor ever will!)
5) I was an actor and writer for a Children's Theater Company for about a year, touring schools and libraries
6) I love the rain and am creatively energized by thunderstorms
7) My dearest wish since I was small was to talk to animals (completely influenced by fairy tales). This eventually led me to getting an Advanced Certificate (2 yrs pre-veterinary) in Animal Care with an emphasis on Marsupials!



Inspiring Bloggers on my personal MUST-READ list for Fairy Tale News & Thoughtful FT Discussions:
  • Kristin of Tales of Faerie (amazing armchair fairy tale scholar with awesome research skills who writes very readable informative posts, that are also very inspiring)
  • Heidi Anne Heiner of SurLaLune site and blog (fairy tale study today wouldn't be the same without her and she remains as relevant and insightful as ever)
  • Tahlia Merrill Kirk of Diamonds & Toads & editor of Timeless Tales Magazine (& OUABLog's new partner-to-be! Perhaps obviously, we think she's awesome.)
  • Adam Hoffman of Fairy Tale Fandom (a very welcome male voice in the fairy tale blogosphere - regular news and wonderful articles)
  • AFTS (Australian Fairy Tale Society) with Reilly McCarron currently leading the charge (very regular fairy tale news with an emphasis on activity in Australia)
  • Megan Reichelt of The Dark Forest (she doesn't get to blog much these days  - she's busy performing stories! - but there are many wonderful past posts to delve into, if there isn't anything new. I love her witty writing style!)


Other Inspiring Bloggers I love to visit (in alpha order):
If you have been awarded and wish to continue passing on the inspiration (there is no obligation to do this), here's what you need to do: 
- Link to the person who awarded you (me!) 
- List seven things about yourself your bloggers may not know (yet) 
- Grab the award pic and post it on your blog post for all to see 
- List - and link to - up to fifteen bloggers who inspire you and award them! (And let them know so they can get involved if they want to.)

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Congratulations To Our New Fairy Tale Knights: Dame Marina Warner & Dame Carol Ann Duffy

The New Year has recognized TWO female champions of fairy tale research and writing, including poetry by awarding them knighthoods. (Dames are the female Knight equivalent).
   

Among those made Dames for the 2015 New Years Honors:
- Marina Warner, professor of English and creative writing at Birkbeck, University of London, for services to higher education and literary scholarship. 
- Carol Ann Duffy, professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, for services to poetry. (source)
Congratulations to both!

We are so glad your work has become so widely recognized. I know I'm not alone when I say your ongoing work has been personally life changing.

Cheers! *raises goblets & clinks*

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Theater: "The Magic Hour" - A Contemporary, Grim(m), One Woman Comedy & Storytelling Show That's Casting It's Spell Over Critics & Audiences Alike

If you follow the AFTS (Australian Fairy Tale Society) on Facebook, you will see I already sent word about this play there but I wanted to highlight ittoo, so everyone is aware of it, as it sounds refreshingly different and quite gutsy (what we like to see!).

Not only that, every review I've read gives glowing praise, with only good things to say about both the production and Ms. Yovich, to the point that there are rumors about it being THE theatrical production of 2014.

First, a little intro so you have an idea of what all the raving is about:

From EventFinder:
Starring Helpmann Award-winning actress Ursula Yovich (Capricornia, The Secret River and ABC TV’s Gods of Wheat Street and Redfern Now), this celebrated evening of song and storytelling is a deliciously dark interpretation of classic Grimms’ fairy tales.
The Magic Hour is set in a contemporary urban landscape and tells the stories of fairy tales’ sidelined characters including Rapunzel’s captor, Red Riding Hood’s granny and Cinderella’s ugly stepsister.
A gutsy one-woman comedy, The Magic Hour reveals the rich social commentary embedded in these magical tales and reflects on the gritty lives of the women that inspired the characters with a haunting realism.
Written by award-winning Australian playwright Vanessa Bates (Chipper, Porn. Cake, Every Second), The Magic Hour is the swansong production for Deckchair Theatre and promises an evening of no sugar-coated children’s stories. 
Sounds really interesting, right? (If I were in Oz for the conference , I'd certainly be joining a bunch of AFTS folk to go see this at Riverside Paramatta (oh to be able to see a fairy tale event with fairy tale folk!) Take a look at the promo video:
The one woman who plays all the roles, engages the audience in storytelling and in song, is Ursula Yovich, a talented award winning indigenous actress and a brief interview discussing The Magic Hour can be found HERE.
To give you even more of a picture, here's some of the press release:
Thought you knew Grimm’s fairy tales? Think again.
Once upon a time…. 
Hidden in the crevices, drawn from the gutters and alleyways of life, comes a startling retelling of classic fairy tales. This deliciously wicked and dangerously funny one-woman show stars Helpmann Award winning actor and singer Ursula Yovich (Australia, Jindabyne, The Secret River). 
She expertly takes familiar aspects of Grimm’s tales and characters from stories of Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and others and cleverly manipulates them into more modern versions and settings. Do not expect sugar-coated children’s stories here. The Magic Hour is gritty, with an air of dark comedy and haunting realism.  
From one of Australia’s most original contemporary playwrights, Vanessa Bates, The Magic Hour is a gutsy one-woman comedy told with dark humour and soulful song. 
This is story-telling for grown-ups at its very best. A night of stories told at twilight with werewolves and a touch of magic…

And there's a great summary review courtesy of The Blurb Magazine, which details more of the performance that only makes me want to see it all the more. Here's a taste:
It began with the set, a beautifully lit open space with a corrugated and wood gypsy-style caravan and the trappings of an Aboriginal outback camp site designed by Alicia Clements. Props and costumes were cleverly tucked away in various drawers, and windows and shutters opened and closed to add another dimension to the stories. Joe Lui’s lighting design shone brightly on the caravan and let the edges drift into darkness; a perfect setting for some dark tales. 
Ursula Yovich wandered onto the set, talked to the audience, and checked how her pumpkin soup was cooking on her bush stove. Then she began telling her stories and, with a variety of shawls, fur, wraps and coats, body language and a change of vocal tone she created many different and very real characters. The props were hung out on a washing line at the end of each story, which gave the show a neat continuity. 
She had the sell-out audience enthralled and proved what a brilliant storyteller she is. She weaved a spell as she retold six traditional fairytales penned by Vanessa Bates that were set well away from the original locations. 
... It truly was fairytales like you’ve not heard them before. Why: because they were told from angle of other characters in the story. The essence of the ancient tales remained while the people became modern and fractured; the sick, the dispossessed, druggies, the victims who had slipped through the cracks.
You can read the whole, much longer, review HERE.

And I want a full report from the AFTS conference attendees who are lucky enough to go see this please! (Pretty please..?)
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