Fairy Tale Review Archive
Browse submissions from past editions, web exclusive content, author Q&A, and more.
The practice of retelling fairy tales in the form of literary fiction is, if not quite hallowed, certainly established. The great Angela Carter’s revelatory 1979 story collection, “The Bloody Chamber” — a brocaded work of heady sensuality, intelligence and violence — remains the benchmark, but Kate Bernheimer’s Fairy Tale Review and the several excellent Bernheimer-edited anthologies spun off from it carry the standard forward. Those are just some of the more overt homages; Western literature owes as much to fairy tales as it does to Greek myth and the Bible.
-The New York Times
Coven
We chant around the grill in our backyard every Friday the 13th to scare the neighbors who told the Homeowners’ Association our violet paint job was garish.
‘No Place (Dorothy Reconsiders)’ & ‘Dorothy in the Desert’
Out here the din of tin on tin hangs
just below an orphaned smudge of cumulus,
threatening fickle weather.
The Lemon Tree
A farmer was wandering through his orchard at harvest time, when he saw an apple hanging from one of his lemon trees.
Miscellany: Chinese Moon Goddess
Smashing Pumpkins’ music video (photo on right) of “Tonight, Tonight” gives a nod to that early horror/ sci fi...
Pins & Needles No. 36: Richard Siken
No. 36: Richard Siken Q. Let’s get a little metaphysical. At the end of your poem, “The Story of the Moon,” you write “one wonders why a story like...
Fairy-Tale Files: Can I Get a Cheats Death?
Fairy-Tale Files, published once weekly, feature three variations of a fairy tale chosen by one of Fairy Tale Review’s editors, interns, or past...
Pins & Needles No. 35: Sequoia Nagamatsu
No. 35: Sequoia Nagamatsu Q. How do you see names, and giving names to things, working in your story, considering most of the things given formal...
Bestiary Friday: The Church Grim
I first met the Church Grim in the iOS game Year Walk (Simogo Games, 2013)— one of the few games I’ve played since adolescence and one that...
Pins & Needles No. 34: Lucas Church
No. 34: Lucas Church Q. How did you prepare for and navigate through this story with all the stigmas and stereotypes surrounding obese people...
Fairy-Tale Files: Foxy-Woxy’s Apocalypse
Fairy-Tale Files, published once weekly, feature three variations of a fairy tale chosen by one of Fairy Tale Review’s editors, interns, or past...
Fairy Tale Review and the VIDA Count
From its founding in 2005, Kate Bernheimer wanted to create a literary journal reflective of the accessibility and universality of fairy tales as a...
Pins & Needles No. 33: Rachel Zavecz
No. 33: Rachel Zavecz Q. In addition to the linguistic hyperdrive pirouetting through “Six” (“wetly the blooded stump (fanging hotly whitened nails...
Fairy-Tale Files: Plight of the Coyote
Fairy-Tale Files, published once weekly, feature three variations of a fairy tale chosen by one of Fairy Tale Review’s editors, interns, or past...
Pins & Needles No. 32: Traci Brimhall
No. 32: Traci Brimhall Q. I really enjoyed how your piece builds a world without exposition, relying on the riotous and grief-filled actions of the...
Fairy-Tale Files: Artemis and Actaeon
Fairy-Tale Files, published once weekly, feature three variations of a fairy tale chosen by one of Fairy Tale Review’s editors, interns, or past...
