An often engaging set of celebrated literary works with fun twists.
In Moore’s sequel fantasy collection, a family protects true stories disguised as popular fairy and folktales.
The Wellingtons have dedicated generations of family members to being “Keepers of the Tales.” These historians and anthropologists know the truth behind stories that the world has written off as fiction. Nowadays, Charles Wellington III safeguards their library of works, but it was his great-great grandfather Charles Wellington I who stumbled onto a life-changing artifact. He and a colleague unearthed part of a mysterious linen canvas inscribed with an ancient language, and he scoured far-off places, such as Turkey, for the remaining fragments. About a third of the 14-story collection centers on the first Charles as he searches for hidden truths in the canvas and runs into the enigmatic “Guardians.” The rest consists of tales that the later Charles has amassed. The first two, “Beauty…and the Beastly Prince” and “Sleeping Beauty,” have a surprising link: fairy sisters—a queen and her evil older princess sibling—who feud for years, hurting themselves as well as their children in countless ways. Others sport similar titles that make the fairy-tale or folklore source immediately apparent and follow those earlier narratives closely. In “Margaretha and the Seven Dwarfs,” Count Philip sends his daughter, whom he affectionately calls Snow White, out of Germany, afraid that his wife will do something terrible to his daughter. This collection aptly bookends the final tale with the prologue and resolves the first Charles’ plotline, with plenty more of the Wellingtons’ backstory left for another book.
As in his preceding collection, Twisted Fairy Tells: The Untold Truths (2021), Moore offers serious but occasionally playful interpretations. For example, “Jack” features the titular hero and the famous beanstalk only for the latter half of the story to dive deep into his family’s genuinely engrossing history. In the fun “Jack Frost,” the Arctic-dwelling protagonist revels in his specialty of “ruining anyone’s day” and bumps into another, decidedly more sinister character from folklore. The author occasionally enhances stories with real-world links; there are nods to the bubonic plague epidemic, and one tale deftly incorporates a 14th-century witch trial in Ireland along with the bishop involved and an accused woman. Although the collected tales take some unexpected turns, they’re not always as twisty as the book’s title suggests. “Cinder Ella” is entertaining but relatively light and not nearly as dark or memorable as the version by the Brothers Grimm. The fairy-tale variations, like the originals, are quick reads, as Moore writes character-driven narratives with impressive conciseness. On the other hand, the first Charles’ leisurely paced multistory journey retains a sense of ambiguity until he finally pieces the artifact together. It continually intrigues, though, even if the mystery of his dead friend is no mystery to readers. Unfortunately, most fairy tales open with the later Charles’ brief thoughts that offer morals that readers could have figured out on their own. Still, this is a minor complaint about an otherwise solid collection.
An often engaging set of celebrated literary works with fun twists.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-66554-990-5
Page Count: 310
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
A freewheeling, action-packed fantasy with a dash of romance.
Kova offers a fantasy novel set beyond the Nightgale Mountains in the walled fortress of Vinguard where citizens live in fear of the next deadly dragon attack.
Vinguard’s residents are always on guard against the threat of dragons, but they must watch more than just the skies. Living among them, hiding in plain sight, are the “dragon cursed”—people who, at any moment, may transform into terrifying winged beasts and destroy the city from within. For most of Isola Thaz’s life, she’s been told she’s the reincarnated savior of Vinguard. But just as she begins to suspect that she may be dragon cursed, she’s tossed into Vinguard’s Tribunal—a contest in which every 18-year-old competes in tests of skill and might to separate loyal citizens from the dragon cursed. As she’s sequestered for this rite of passage, Isola hesitantly allies herself with a handsome fellow competitor named Lucan. However, as the teens face such trials as fire-breathing automatons (“The silver beast comes to life with a swing. Its claws shear through the dim light”), starvation, and actual dragons while unarmed, Isola begins to feel that Vinguard’s traditions come at a cost that’s too steep. Meanwhile, Vicar Darius, Lucan’s father and the leader of Vinguard’s shadowy theocracy, the Creed, is desperate to take Isola’s powers for himself—and, to that end, he puts her into increasingly tortuous situations. However, neither he, nor Isola’s teenage rivals, are very compelling antagonists; instead, they come across as caricatures of cruelty. Still, the novel is fast-paced and action-oriented with a punchy prose that prioritizes movement over fantasy aesthetics. A sometimes-fraught romance between Isola and Lucan slowly blooms, but Isola’s relationship with her family forms the true emotional core of the narrative. Although the worldbuilding in fairly simple, the story sets up a massive mystery that promises big payoffs in a potential future installment.
A freewheeling, action-packed fantasy with a dash of romance.Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2026
ISBN: 9781649377838
Page Count: 448
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
