Now reading: Ash

I typically use awards that books have received as a gauge to decide whether I would buy and read a book, or not.

So saying, Malinda Lo's Ash was a shoo-in for my book pile.

I soon realized that it was a completely different configuration of the Cinderella trope. I have always loved the re-telling of fairy tales. This is why Robin McKinley's Beauty and Rose Daughter are among my best-loved stories of all time. When I picked up Ash, I loved the idea of introducing the element of a fairy, that is, a sidhe, into the story of Cinderella.

The book had a fresh take on the development of the heroine. Simply put, the love interest is another girl. In stories of this genre, the author has a very challenging task, indeed, to walk that fine line between revelation and critique, on the one hand, and repackaging something and calling it new. I was interested to see how the character playing the love interest in the story re-structures questions of power, strength, weakness, love, and identity. I mean, is she an actual female character, or will her gender formulation in the story, when unravelled to the core, would simply reveal a man?

If you're reading Ash for the first time, know that you are entering a lyric, mesmerizing landscape. However, the story would require more soul-searching and insight in terms of what it means to be a woman. It's a different kind of soul work and  recasts questions about identity and sexuality than what Graceling posed, or even The Blue Sword.

On another matter, I have just discovered a new book by one of my favorite authors, Franny Billingsley. The title is Chime , and I am curious to see if it truly lives up to the glowing reviews I've read about it. I've waited for her to write another book after falling in love with her The Folk Keeper years ago. And with a long vacation coming up, I'm excited to have found what promises to be a delicious book to fall headlong into.