Writing Sleeping Beauty

I took quite a few liberties with my version of Sleeping Beauty, and I will be the first to admit it was mostly to make things more logical, and also out of spite.

For example, I didn’t want to make the king proclaim that all spinning wheels must be destroyed–my characters live in a world that is far too logical to submit to that nonsense. So I ended up shipping Briar Rose off to the countryside–which suited me perfectly as I wanted to explore the dynamics of her being raised apart from her family.

Isaia’s role as a magic knight instead of a prince is my petty bit of spite. While I love fairy tales I do get sick of writing mostly about princes or princesses–Rumpelstiltskin has been my only reprieve thus far.  In reading the many different versions of sleeping beauty I ended up developing a serious antipathy towards the prince who awakens the princess.

As you may recall, he is nothing like Disney’s Prince Phillip who battles for Aurora, and instead he waltzes into the castle and manages to awaken the princess solely because the required 100 years had passed. Not. A. Fan.

Keeping that in mind, I knew I wanted Briar’s romantic relationship to be different from my previous gals, and using a childhood friend she had known for a long time was a great way to introduce a new dynamic! (It doesn’t hurt that I am a huge sucker for stories where the princess falls for her guard!) The change in the relationship compared to the typical boy-meets-girl-and-falls-in-love made Sleeping Beauty really fun to write as I got to bring out a different level of emotions and complexities between them.

I used the true love’s kiss to break Briar’s curse, because the Brothers Grimm’s Little Briar Rose has the prince kiss the sleeping princess awake, and I was taking a few more cues from it than Perrault’s French fairy tale. (Also I wanted to begin needling poor Angelique at a young age. The next time she has to modify a curse with true love’s kiss, she just may crack!)

In honor of what is considered the “original” sleeping beauty, Sun, Moon, and Talia–which was written by an Italian poet–Sole culture is  loosely based on Rennisance Italian culture. (You can see it in the fashion with the veils over the hair and the puffed gown sleeves, the food, the names, and the excessive use of marble/stone and wall frescos.) However, like all the other countries its government has its quirks. While Erlauf has its armies and Arcainia its blue-stocking royals, Sole is known for its magic knights. The country values things like honor, justice, and chivalry, but you can also see it in the decor. (I sprinkled knight/weapon/horse themed statues, tapestries, frescos, etc, everywhere!)

It was fun because I got to tackle a bit more of the world building in Sole than I did with Kozlovka in Swan Lake–but that’s because Swan Lake mostly takes place in the middle of a forest.

And thus ends our Sleeping Beauty lessons! And if you're interested in reading my adaptation of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale you can get my standalone story in Kindle Unlimited, or ebook / paperback!

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Sleeping Beauty: Morals and Themes

Today we’re going to dig into the morals and themes presented in Sleeping Beauty.

Sleeping Beauty was one of the few fairy tales that made me pause and actually wonder what on earth anyone could find instructive/helpful about it. (I say that with all my love, because really, have you entertained any fairies recently?)

Thankfully Perrault–who as you might remember the Brothers Grimm’s story was an orally shared version of his tale–spells out the moral at the end of the book.

Perrault says the moral is–I kid you not–be patient in waiting for love. I was actually surprised at the sound logic behind that, and the way he phrases it is actually quite humorous. See for yourself!

“Many a girl has waited long For a husband brave or strong; But I’m sure I never met Any sort of woman yet Who could wait a hundred years, Free from fretting, free from fears.

Now, our story seems to show That a century or so, Late or early, matters not; True love comes by fairy-lot. Some old folk will even say It grows better by delay.

Yet this good advice, I fear, Helps us neither there nor here. Though philosophers may prate How much wiser ’tis to wait, Maids will be a sighing still — Young blood must when young blood will!”

For those who are curious, yes, Perrault wrote this in his French retelling. The website I found it at said the translation of the moral (because it was omitted by earlier translations) comes from Perrault’s Fairy Tales, translated by S. R. Littlewood (London: Herbert and Daniel, 1912).

Though it might seem odd, this is really a moral I could get behind, and that’s partially why I made Briar and Isaia childhood friends and their relationship so long in developing. But while patience in love is the moral, there are still other bits of symbolism and themes in the story that deserve a closer look.

I briefly mentioned it previously, but when the king proclaimed that all spinning wheels should be destroyed and anyone caught owning/using one would be put to death, it was an insipidly-stupid idea. This fairy tale takes place in a time where the only way for the general populace to produce thread/fabrics, was to spin it. By destroying all the spinning wheels in the kingdom, he was robbing his people of a way to clothe themselves–not to mention I imagine he put a ton of people out of business. (Think about it–not just spinners and weavers, but farmers who owned sheep would now have to take the wool to a neighboring kingdom so it could be put to use! The same goes for flax farmers.)

Furthermore, it would greatly impact the kingdom’s economy. Prices on fabrics would hike up drastically because everything would have to be imported, and while other countries would profit the people would suffer.

But that’s only if people actually obeyed the king. We know they didn’t because the princess pricks her finger on a spindle, so there’s still some machines around.

The King’s order is clearly too bull-headed and impossible that the people cannot follow it. It’s very similar to the “turning-straw-to-gold” bit of Rumpelstiltskin. (Which, as you might recall, is extra impossible because straw can’t be used in spinning or for anything, so the king was telling the girl to make something from nothing.)

I feel like the King’s stubborn actions are a second moral. It shows that you can make unreasonable demands based off fear and terror, and what you fear may still come to pass.

In fact, reading about the king’s proclamation is what inspired me to have Briar set off the curse on her own free will. Briar’s family–like the king from the original–are filled with fear, and they make poor decisions as a result.

Briar, however, acknowledges her fear and steps forward to face her curse anyway. If Isaia hadn’t been so stubborn, her idea to set off the curse would have been smashing, and in the end she’s the hero–not because she fought but because she stirred the Magic Knights and was determined to face Carabosso if no one else would.

And if you're interested in reading my sweet fantasy romance retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale you can get my standalone story in Kindle Unlimited, or ebook / paperback!

Click here for Amazon.com  OR Click here for other Amazon stores

Cover Reveal: Snowflakes: A Short Story Collection

Good day to you, Champions! The big news for today is that Snowflakes–the Snow Queen short story collection–is now available for pre-order! Woohoo!

Snowflakes will launch January 14–that’s a Saturday, or Friday night if you’re a midnight reader–and is temporarily on sale for 99 cents! Once it’s released, I’m going to up the price to $1.99, but I wanted to give you all a chance to buy it for 99 cents first.

This collection contains all the extras/short stories that were available on my website, as well as three new ones! 1) A short story told from Steinar’s POV. (I wrote it to finish off The Attendant’s Story and the Captain’s Story, so they’re a matched set now!) 2) A short story that examines where Farrin got his barely mentioned jade wolf statue from. 3) A short story–the longest of them all–that brings in the adorable dogs shown above (those dogs should ring bells for any Rumpelstiltskin fans out there) and also reveals what happened to Aleifr–the soldier who tried to kill Rakel.

I’ve been planning for those dogs since I wrote Rumpelstiltskin, so it was great to be able to finally bring them into the story! And as usual, Myrrhlynn–my cover artist–did another fantastic job with this cover! I fretted a lot because I wanted to make it obvious it was a short story collection and not a new novel, so I really appreciated the banner she added at the bottom. (That banner actually matches the binding of the paperback books. Woohoo for a cover artist who appreciates details!)

That’s all for today! Tomorrow you’ll get another Sleeping Beauty post, and the last freebie! (Which, yes, is about Delanna.)