★★★☆☆ Average
(Fairy Tale Pastiche) The Big Bad Wolf from “Little Red Riding Hood” tells us how lots of fairy tales happened a little differently from the way we might have learned them as kids. (2,408 words; Time: 08m)
"Toothsome Things," by Chimedum Ohaegbu [bio] (edited by Jane Crowley and Kate Dollarhyde), appeared in Strange Horizons issue 11/19/18, published on November 19, 2018.
Mini-Review (click to view--possible spoilers)
Review: 2018.681 (A Word for Authors)
Pro: There’s something amusing about the Big Bad Wolf lecturing Little Red Riding Hood (who is already in his stomach) about how wolves really got a bad deal. The various twists on the conventional fairy tales are entertaining.
"Bianca" means "white" in Italian, so it's a good name for Snow White to have.
Con: It seems to be trying too hard to deliver an ecological message. The recasting of the story of Snow White doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense here; the wolf was Snow White’s grand child?
Other Reviews: Search Web, Browse Review Sites (Issue 11/19/18)
Chimedum Ohaegbu Info: Interviews, Websites, ISFDB, FreeSFOnline
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Pro: There’s something amusing about the Big Bad Wolf lecturing Little Red Riding Hood (who is already in his stomach) about how wolves really got a bad deal. The various twists on the conventional fairy tales are entertaining.
"Bianca" means "white" in Italian, so it's a good name for Snow White to have.
Con: It seems to be trying too hard to deliver an ecological message. The recasting of the story of Snow White doesn’t seem to make a whole lot of sense here; the wolf was Snow White’s grand child?
Other Reviews: Search Web, Browse Review Sites (Issue 11/19/18)
Chimedum Ohaegbu Info: Interviews, Websites, ISFDB, FreeSFOnline
Follow RSR on Twitter, Facebook, RSS, or E-mail.
I don't understand this story as trying to deliver an ecological message but rather being a tale about women not having power, not being heard, not being believed.
ReplyDeleteI'd say it probably is talking about abuse, considering the subtext in Little Red Riding Hood about her grandmothers Marie and Bianca. The story about Marie being "killed" twice by the woodsman but the gods not noticing could well be a metaphor for rape.
The wolf seems to be Bianca, already old and probably a little out of her mind. Little Red Riding Hood explicitly says so: "But Bianca, oh grandmother mine, it is good to meet you, even ravenous and multiple as you are, even though your form and current state confuse me."
Hmmm. I can sort of see that interpretation. I get the eco message from passages like "No, we will tear and rip and shred and ravage these hunters until they know for certain and forever that wolves remain, that we remain, that I remain."
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