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  • The Curse of the Thirteenth Fey: The True Tale of Sleeping Beauty
  • Kate Quealy-Gainer
Yolen, Jane . The Curse of the Thirteenth Fey: The True Tale of Sleeping Beauty. Philomel, 2012. 290p. ISBN 978-0-399-25664-6 $16.99 M Gr. 4-6.

Magic tends to give thirteen-year-old Gorse a headache, and unfortunately she has to deal with a lot of it: as the thirteenth child of a fey mother and an elven father, she is part of a magical family whose powers are often called upon by the human king. Gorse is laid up in bed yet again when her family gets the call to attend the infant princess' christening (and bestow magical gifts upon her), but she manages to drag herself after them; unfortunately, she doesn't quite make it to the palace but instead falls down a "magick trap" that has her imprisoned underground and beholden to yet another unyielding royal, this time a member of the cruel Unseelie court. Culling material from several short stories she published in the 1980s, the prolific Yolen offers an uncharacteristic misstep here with a muddled plotline, an uneven pace, and an uninspiring heroine. Though the book is billed as the "true tale of Sleeping Beauty," the connection to the original story isn't made clear until nearly the final pages and even then, the reveal of Gorse as the fairy who accidentally cursed the princess is anticlimactic and convoluted. Fans of retold fairy tales will be better served by Yolen's other offerings or Diane Zahler's recent interpretations (The Thirteenth Princess, BCCB 3/10, The Princess of the Wild Swans, BCCB 2/12).

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