Oldies But Goodies
{Put This One on Your TBR List}
The Raven and the
Reindeer by T. Kingfisher
by Karen S. Wiesner
Beware major spoilers (you'll get pretty much the
whole story here)! Of late on the Alien Romances Blog, I've been reviewing "reimagined and unconventional fairytales" written by T. Kingfisher. In my first take on Kingfisher's loose renderings of fairytales, I reviewed Nettle & Bone, which is basically a subversion of everything that's been done in a fairytale all rolled into one, along with Bryony and Roses ("Beauty and the Beast") and Thornhedge ("Sleeping Beauty"). After that, I reviewed The Seventh Bride ("Mr. Fox"/"The Robber Bridegroom", and other aberrations) by itself followed by A Sorceress Comes to Call ("The Goose Girl").
In preparation for reading The Raven and the Reindeer, a 2016 LGBTQ fantasy release, I re-read the 1844 original Danish tale "The Snow Queen" published in New Fairy Tales, First Volume by Hans Christian Andersen. You can find it online free in many different places. Unlike most of these fairytales, this one is presented in seven long, mostly boring chapters in which a lot of crap that doesn't matter in the least is included and the stuff that's really important is unforgivably skated over (more about that later). Some inventive adaptations of the original that most people will know include C. S. Lewis's The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and Disney's Frozen.
So the basic story in "The
Snow Queen" is that the devil makes a magic mirror that reflects only the
worst aspects of everyone and everything. When it shatters, pieces of it fall
and get stuck in people's eyes and hearts, forcing them to become cold and
bitter. Gerda and Kai (both names are spelled differently from one variation to
the next) are children who grow up next door to each other. Gerda is in love
with Kai, he kisses her, but then splinters of the mirror get in his eye and heart,
changing him. The Snow Queen comes to town and takes Kai away with her. Gerda
is determined to rescue him and goes through a whole lot to do that, though
mainly we're forced to endure a lot of boring prose that does nothing to
further the tale. All the aspects of "magic" and the supernatural
that are the point of this whole story are offered up as short, simple facts, a
presumption of acceptance is thrown down like a gauntlet, and readers dare not
question the plausibility of anything. Boiled down, the series of events Gerda
goes through are:
1)
Gerda is
enchanted by a witch who puts her to work in her garden for an endless amount of
time until she's able to wake up…you know, somehow.
2)
A crow Gerda
can talk to tells her he might have seen Kai in a palace--but it's not him, so
it was a big waste of time even going there.
3)
Gerda is
kidnapped by a band of robbers, but the robber girl and her reindeer decide to
help Gerda instead.
4)
Traveling
north, they meet two women. The second tells the reindeer that Gerda has
special power that can save Kai--her sweet and innocent child's heart. If she can't
figure it out from there, well, that's her problem!
5)
They get
to the Snow Queen's palace and enter easily. This is where Kai has been put to
work on a Mirror of Reason puzzle that enchants him to stay where he is
forever. Gerda rushes to him and kisses him, the spell is broken, and her tears
melt the splinters in his heart and eye.
6) Happily ever after. I said, happily ever after, sir! Just accept it, okay? How, what, when, where, why? you splutter. It just is. I don't know what happened to the crow or the robber girl or the reindeer. Gerda and Kai get away--the Snow Queen apparently was getting her hair done or something, and they're free to leave, go home, and Grandma reads a passage from the Bible about changing and becoming as little children to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. I'm confused. What just happened? Does any of this make the slightest bit of sense? The bigger question, to me, is, how did this story become such a popular one? I mentioned two popular retellings, but there are dozens in existence. Unfathomably. In Kingfisher's acknowledgements, she wonders about that as well. Maybe because it was done so incompletely and poorly?
So, here's my big gripe: Nearly all old fairytales present a story that's almost always rife with unbelievable magic or events that are in no way explained, justifiable, or even particularly detailed. More like's it's presented as if readers are expected to go along with it, like, "Oh, it's magic/unbelievable/crazy. So that happened. Okay, I believe it. Onward!" Except you can't quite believe it because there's no basis for justification. You either move forward, accept that it's all silly and just keep reading because period…or you don't. It's as if the authors didn't feel the need to get their audience to accept the plausibility of their tales. You'd think they would or could have at least tried to provide some kind of elucidation. So often, they didn't bother. Don't ask me why not, or why the publishers didn't make it a requirement then. I can't even imagine.
I realize most of you already know what the literary concept of "suspension of disbelief" is, but I'll reiterate the gist of it here just to make sure everyone's on the same page, since that's the foundation of this review. In essence, a valid explanation is introduced early in the story that gives the readers what they need to accept something fantastically implausible. If a reader isn't given this justification, it's almost impossible for them to immerse themselves in the story at any point. It's too unbelievable. I'd add that readers who aren't given something convincing enough in this regard either chuck the book over the side of the boat or they spend the rest of the narration in the booing section, shouting snide comments like, "And how exactly did they do that?" every few seconds.
The original fairytale "The Snow Queen" is one of the worst I've ever seen when it comes to the author not giving even the slightest hint of something that would allow suspension of disbelief. Readers are moved from one situation to the next and, if the writer had done the slightest bit of work (hey, that's part of the craft!), maybe those situation could have been exciting and worthwhile. Instead, we're just left to muddle our way through a thicket of dense forest in the dark with no idea what's important and what's not. We're relieved when it's over, sure, but not for the reason I suspect the author intended.
T. Kingfisher's rendition, The Raven and the Reindeer, went through every single chapter of Anderson's pitiful, poorly constructed story and gave us worthy justifications that allowed for suspension of disbelief from start to finish. As I read "The Snow Queen", the same question kept come back from one scenario to the next: "How in the world did that work?" I never found out. The author had a really good idea for a story, but he didn't bother to write anything but this skeleton that was bloated with unsightly and painful boils. Mainly, he got sidetracked by silliness that does not story construction make.
So now I'll tell you how
Kingfisher told this tale: Gerta is in love with Kay, and though they're
friends, he doesn't seem to know what to make of their relationship, though he
does kiss her once--something that confuses her, as well it should. They grew
up as neighbors. He's a strange boy who likes puzzles, but she doesn't mind his
oddities, though she's put off by them sometimes, internalizing them. She has a
nightmare one night, in which Kay is kidnapped by a frost queen in a sled. The
next morning, she sees something is definitely going on because the boy she's
known all her life has become cold and cruel. Not long later, Kay goes missing
and Gerta realizes, after talking to her very knowledgeable grandmother, that
it was the Snow Queen who took him. Gerta is determined to get him back. She
thinks she may be in love with him, but she isn't sure about that. She sets off
and doesn't really know where to go or how to get there, which is probably why
she fumbles through so many bad episodes along the way. Boiled down, the series
of events Gerta follows after this point are:
1)
Gerta is
enchanted by a witch who isn't evil or particularly powerful, just lonely. She
puts her under an enchantment. Every day Gerta works in her garden. Seven
months pass. A memory of Kay jars Gerta so she wakes up to realize something
bad is happening to her. She talks to the flowers in the garden, who tell her
Kay can't be dead because, being one with the whole earth, they would know if
his body joined theirs. Gerta confronts the witch, who repents and gives her the
basic supplies she needs to survive her journey.
2)
A raven
named Mousebones that Gerda can talk to joins her on the road. He's loyal and very
helpful in his way, when he wants to be, but he's also sharp-tongued. Fun!
3)
Gerta is
kidnapped by a band of robbers who want to eat her, but the robber girl with
them, Janna, is also a prisoner of sorts. She and her reindeer (who Gerta can
also talk to) decide to help Gerta instead. In fact, the reindeer is so old and
lonely for a herd that he offers up his skin so Gerta can walk the reindeer
road, which is the only way Gerta can get into the Snow Queen's realm. (In
essence, the reindeer willingly gives up his skin so Gerta can wear it and
become a reindeer.) When Janna kisses Gerta, she becomes very confused about
her feelings for Kay.
4)
Traveling
north, they meet an old storyteller who tells them to find Livli, a Lutheran and
one who understands reindeer and cold in ways few others can.
5)
They find
a tunnel into the Snow Queen's palace and, thanks to the very friendly and
adorable otters that pull her sled, they're able to find Kay. The otters don't
feel much loyalty to the monster they're forced to serve. Kay's been put to
work on a puzzle all this time, and he's anything but friendly toward Gerta. He
believes she's wasted her time trying to find him. Gerda has been wondering herself
why she went to all this trouble. But she's reminded that he has ice splinters
in his heart and eye, causing him to be cold and cruel to her and her new
friends.
6) The Snow Queen shows up, and she blasts Gerta with her icy powers. Gerta is, for all intents and purposes, dead--but remember how Gerta could talk to the flowers because they're connected with all things of the earth? Well, now semi-dead, Gerta is also of the earth and "Mother Nature" can talk to her directly. She tells Mother Nature that she's been under the Snow Queen's enchantment all this time, forestalling spring, and causing animals and other things of nature to go hungry, etc. This enrages Mother Nature, and she's coaxed into fighting back against this evil being. Gerta asks if she can be sent back to the world of the living, to Kay, sure, and her animal friends, but mostly to Janna, whom she's fallen in love with and intends to spend the rest of her life with just as soon as Kay is delivered home to his family. The friendly, flying otters are happy to assist now that they're also free.
Even on the basis of this summary, I think you can imagine that this was a very well-constructed, tense, worthwhile story that has a more fitting and appropriate happily ever after than whatever the heck that was in the original tale.
The Raven and the Reindeer takes the rattling bones of Anderson's bad, bad, bad story and makes it something unexpected, fully human, and intriguing. It's almost like a literal retelling in which all the important areas of the original that were foolishly left out are finally explained and logically played out. Gerta isn't someone who really understands herself or the world around her (like, at all), so she falls into a lot of traps, like believing she must be destined to end up with Kay as her soulmate, assuming everyone is honest and above-board, and taking so long to realize that her innate abilities are the very ones she needs to succeed in her quest. The character building here was fairly complex, unlike the original. To round all this out, we're treated to Kingfisher's trademark, animated, loveable creatures. In my opinion, they're what really made this particular story something special.
The author herself (under her real name Ursula Vernon) designed the very cool and stunning cover art.
I'm still hoping to get hold of Hemlock & Silver ("Snow White") soon to complete the circle of review of T. Kingfisher's fairytale retellings.
Karen Wiesner is an award-winning,
multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.
Visit her website and blog here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/
and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog
Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/
Beware spoilers!
Posts
