I loved previous books by Carrie Anne Noble, as well as fairy tale retellings in general, so I eagerly awaited the release of this one. I almost gave up on it the first time around–I did, in fact, until I saw that Jeff Wheeler recommended it. He’s also one of my favorites, so I decided to give it another go. I’m not sorry I finished it, but my opinion of it really never changed, though.
The story follows Marga (the grown-up Gretel of ‘Hansel and Gretel’–she changed her name due to the trauma of her childhood). Once she and Hansel returned to their village after she’d successfully offed the witch, their parents died, and they had only each other. The stigma of their experience followed them–or her, anyway, because for whatever reason, the townspeople began to whisper that Marga herself was a witch and shunned her. Hansel, meanwhile, grew up to be a dissipated and selfish gambler, which basically just serves as an impetus for the story’s action. His debts force the siblings to flee back into the forest, and take refuge in, of all places, the Gingerbread cottage once more. In order to get to it, they have to hitch a ride on the back of an enchanted duck, who turns out to be the witch’s cursed husband. As the time approaches for the curse to be undone, his human understanding begins to return., and he recalls the prophecy of what has to happen in order for him to become a man again. He knows it involves helping Marga to take her rightful place as the witch’s successor.
But Marga, despite the townspeople’s beliefs, is innocence personified. The last thing she wants is to display any kind of magic, or to be anything like the witch. She’s had a crush on a village baker for years, and it turns out he has had one on her as well (this part reminds me a bit of Peeta from “The Hunger Games,”) and when Hansel abandons Marga to her own fate, he comes to her rescue. But the duck (increasingly less duck-like) conspires to force the prophecy that will finally set him free…
I can’t entirely say what it was about this book that didn’t do it for me. It’s whimsical, it’s clean, and it’s imaginative. I guess mostly the issue is that I didn’t find the characters believable enough to be sympathetic, and I had a hard time suspending my disbelief in some very absurd scenarios. But it’s good for light pre-bedtime reading.
My rating: ***
Language: none
Sexual content: none
Violence: none
Political content: none
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