We're two and a half months into 2020 and this is the first post I'm making. If the thought that I've been in a real slump crosses your mind, you'd be right. I've made plans, I've made lists, I was excited about reading and posting more, about taking photos... and none of that really helped. I'm not sure what happened, could I have gotten lazy? Then again, reading never felt like a chore, so...

Anyway, I've read Fierce Fairytales back in January. I started on the right path, I suppose, and then just fell off. Still, even a couple of months later, this collection of poems in still fresh in my mind. It's just what it say s it is - they're fairytales, the classics we've all grown up on, though told in verse and, well, with some twists.

"You must lift a sword

with reborn strength and take on

the demons in your ribcage."

There are several stories retold, usually from different points of view. For example, we have Cinderella's story, then the stepmothers but also the stepsisters' stories - and this all just makes you think, makes you re-evaluate. Not everyone is all good or all bad, there are shades of gray in all of us, and each person carries their own burden. Everything we do is a consequence of something - something we saw or heard or had been done to us - and every deed has a backstory.

"I was not made

to be lovely for you

I was made to eat monsters for me."

You'll hear from Captain Hook, from Wendy, Cinderella's mother (her "be kind" did not mean "let people walk all over you"), from the Mad Hatter (why is he mad?), from Baba Yaga (this one was suck a lovely, unexpected surprise because I am still reeling in the experience of The Winternight Trilogy), from the Sea Witch that took Ariel's voice, from Ariel herself ("do not make sacrifice the ritual of your womanhood"), from trolls that slumber under bridges, from the sun and moon and hear about the origins of seasons.

It is a lovely storybook made from poems, one that awakens your imagination and will leave you wondering about the other characters from every story. Wonder, don't take anything at face value, examine... Sometimes things aren't as they appear, and even the heroine's story may not have been told faithfully. It is another book that will stay with me, one I have already been coming back to and I hope it will give you the same exhilaration if you pick it up.

"You are the universe's fairytale come true."