Top Ten Tuesday: My Top 10 Favorite Fairy Tale Collections

It is Top Ten Tuesday again, hosted at The Broke and the Bookish, and this week's theme is Ten Fairy Tale Retellings (or something else fairy-tale related). Since I am very picky about re-tellings, but read a TON of folk- and fairy tale collections (it is kind of a job requirement for a storyteller) I decided my top ten will be about My Favorite Fairy Tale Collections. I only selected books that are in English, although some of my childhood loves are among the Hungarian collections. Also, a lot of them contain folk- and fairy tales together.
(I have also done a list of fairy tales I want re-told, not so long ago, so I will just link it here)

Here we go (in no particular order).

Twelve Dancing Princesses (SurLaLune Fairy Tale Series)

This is a collection that contains dozens of versions of one single tale type: That of the Twelve Dancing Princesses. When they ask me which one is my favorite fairy tale, this is usually my first pick. I also adore the idea of the SurLaLune series, which publishes variations of a single tale in each volume. The other volumes are great too.

Arab Folktales by Inea Bushnaq

We had to read the entire Pantheon Fairy Tale Library series for our storytelling classes at ETSU, and it was the best homework ever. Out of the series, Arab Folktales was the one that I liked the most; it just had a lot of stories that clicked with me personally, and a lot of the fairy tales in the collection are exquisitely beautiful.

Apples from Heaven by Naomi Baltuck

This is a collection of folk- and fairy tales that are about storytelling and storytellers. It is a great premise for a book, and the tales are very well selected, and eloquently told.

The Turnip Princess by Franz Xaver von Schönwerth

It only came out this year, and it is a great collection. Remember when everyone was sharing that one article about "500 New Fairy Tales Discovered in Germany"? Well, this is an English translation of that collection. It has some amazing tales in it, and it is more graceful (and emphatic) than the Grimm stories.

Italian Folktales by Italo Calvino

It's a classic, and a truly enchanting one too. Calvino re-writes some of the stories (and makes them better) but also dutifully notes what he changed in the end notes, so if you want, you can look up the original versions too. Some of my favorite fairy tales can be found in this book.

Fearless Girls, Wise Women and Beloved Sisters by Kathleen Ragan

This is a well-selected and well-researched collection of folk- and fairy tales about women, from all over the world. It is a storytelling classic. There are a lot of great stories to be found in it, and also extensive notes. You might have gotten the idea by now that I love extensive notes...

The Pentamerone by Giambattista Basile

Another classic, and one of the first collections I told stories from when I was a beginner storyteller. Colorful, literary retellings of Italian fairy tales from the 16th century. A fascinating read, if you are interested in other versions of fairy tales that are most often known as Grimm.
In addition, it was turned into a gorgeous movie this year!

Cajun Folktales by J. J. Reneaux

I have a soft spot for Cajun culture, and this story collection is amazing. Written by legendary storyteller J. J. Reneaux, it contains my favorite version of Bluebeard, among other things.

Folktales from India by A.K. Ramanujan

Another gorgeous collection of stories from the Pantheon series. There are a lot of unique stories and interesting tale types in there, and many stories deliberately selected because they talk about the importance of storytelling (and listening). All-around beautiful book to read.

The folk-lore of Rome by R. H. Busk

It is an old book, but is very close to my heart. Not only because Rome is my favorite city in the world, but also because Busk collected and compiled a lot of fascinating stories, from fairy tales to local legends, by living there and talking to the people. It is a great collection, especially if you plan to visit the city itself.

Do you have a favorite fairy tale collection I didn't list? I would love to know!

Top Ten Tuesday: Make these books into movies NOW (pretty please)

More specifically, good movies if possible. If not possible, respectfully, leave them alone.

It is Top Ten Tuesday again, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week's theme: Top Ten Books I'd Like to See as Movies/TV Shows. So, this is my regularly scheduled cry to the universe. It worked the last time I tried, so I there is hope (Thank you, Internet!).

Here is my wishlist:

Mary Renault: The King Must Die

I know I keep mentioning this book, but it has been a long time movie dream of mine. Not many movies take place in Minoan Crete (can you think of any?...), even though it would make a gorgeous setting, full of color and life. And bull-dancers! And women with vests that leave their boobs out! (Hollywood just left the room, didn't they). It's mythology, and action, and history, and acrobatics, and visuals, and boobs, and layered characters. 

Guys. Seriously.

Marvel's Runaways

Joss Whedon. All you need to know. He was actually casting for a Runaways movie before the Avengers came along, and the project has been on hold ever since. The closest thing we got to a Runaways flick was Big Hero 6 (which really is pretty much Runaways in disguise, when you think about it). But I would really, really love to see the real thing.

Also, Jurassic World proves that Hollywood is totally ready for pet dinosaurs.

Marissa Meyer: The Lunar Chronicles

I am guessing already that this one will take the cake in this week's TTT. I put it on my list too, even though I'm ambivalent about it: I would love to see it happen and done well, but at the same time, I love it how Meyer never gave detailed descriptions of her characters, and I don't want canon faces attached to them. Hard choice.

William Joyce: Jack Frost (Guardians of Childhood)

I'm totally cheating here: I really just want a sequel to Rise of the Guardians. I really, really, really do. Pretty please?

(But I am also looking forward to the book! It looks very pretty.)

Michael Ende: Momo

I can imagine this book done in the animation style of Song of the Sea. The same author as The Neverending Story, but a more concise and smaller-scale tale about the nature of time, life, and storytelling. Ende deserved a Nobel for this one.

Gods and Fighting Men

Please, someone, for the love of everything that's holy, make a cable TV show out of the Fianna legends. Rated R or higher, and done with a team of storytellers and cultural advisors. It has to be TV because you'll never cram all of them in a movie format; and it has to be well done, otherwise the wrath of all storytellers in the world will descend on you and you will suffer in Irish stereotype hell for all eternity, tortured by cheerful plastic leprechauns.

(Yes, I have strong feelings about stories I like, why do you ask?)

Vladimir Obruchev: Plutonia

One of the great book loves of my childhood, this volume tells the story of a team of Russian scientists that descend into the inside of the hollow Earth to find cavemen, ice age megafauna, and dinosaurs still living in there. What I love about it is that it was very Russian-scientific: The characters took their time to measure, take samples, document, and follow procedure. There is no Hollywood archaeology in it, no "oh look, that goo looks funny, let's put my hands in it" bullshit. There are definitely adventures - but the heroes are real scientists that stick to their main goal of exploring, even in the midst of being chased by giant ants. The film world is overdue for a movie with science done right.

I know this is only 7, but I have already exhausted my wishing powers for this week. Looking forward to seeing what other TTT participants are hoping for!

Top Ten Tuesday: A Beach Bag Full of Books on Greece

Once again it's Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week's theme is "Top 10 books I have in my beach bag this summer." First I was going to skip because I am not a beach bag person (I am not even a beach person, thanks to my pasty luminescent complexion), but this is my third week in TTT and I am thoroughly hooked... Also, I do have some travel-related reading to do this summer.
In July I will be flying to Greece to join dozens of other storytellers at the annual FEST (Federation for European Storytelling) conference on Kea Island. This will be my very first trip to Greece, which is shameful, given the fact that I have an MA in Archaeology... But better late than never. As a storyteller I like to prepare for my trips by... reading. A lot. Of stories.
So, without further ado, here is the reading list I plan to complete by July:

Pausanias: Guide to Greece
The classic of classics; if I left it at home I would probably go straight to Classics Hell for it. When I was in college the Hungarian translation was almost impossible to find - when I came across a hidden copy at the bookstore, I spent my entire semester's textbook aid on it. It is a 2nd century AD description of Hellas, in great detail and a lot of intriguing stories.

Ancient Athens on 5 Drachmas a Day
Okay, so this is a fun read, not necessarily a scientific one. It got mixed reviews, and I wouldn't rely on it in serious research... But it sounds entertaining anyway!









John Tomkinson: Travels in Athens
I love reading travel journals, and I was having trouble locating some about Athens. Luckily, I came across this gem of a collection that did all the work for me! Tomkinson compiles excerpts from travel journals and diaries from the 17th century all the way to the 20th from famous travelers, explorers, poets, etc. It is an entire series of books, so wherever you go in Greece, there will be a book for it filled with the adventures of travelers that have gone before you!

John Tomkinson: Travels in the Northern and Western Cyclades
Since my travels will take me to Kea as well as Athens, I also bought the corresponding volume from the series.

Lucian's Dialogues
As my favorite Greek... er, Syrian... er, Hellenistic author, Lucian is definitely taking the trip with me. His Dialogues are some of the most hilarious satire pieces I have read, and they have held up over the past 18 centuries quite well. The volume includes the Dialogues of the Gods (whining about their everyday life and heartbreaks), the Dialogues of the Dead (similarly poignant), and the Dialogues of the Courtesans, painting a vivid picture of the life of women of pleasure in Athens...



On top of these 5, I also have 2 Hungarian books on my list:

1. The travel journal of the Hungarian poet who translated the Iliad, the Odyssey, and a huge chunk of other Greek literature to Hungarian in the first half of the 20th century. He was not only a Classicist and a poetic genius, but also a gentle soul with a great sense of humor. He first visited Greece 25 years after he did all the translation work, and the journal is a touching ode to him finally seeing all the places he spent his life writing about.
(Devecseri Gábor: Epidauroszi tücskök, szóljatok...)
I am taking with me a collection of his poems he wrote on the same trip.

2. The travel journal of one of my favorite Hungarian authors, Magda Szabó, who was also trained in Classics, and on top of writing amazing historical fiction, she also wrote a diary that is both clever and hilarious. Even decades after her trip, I could still use it in Rome to find some hidden gems. I expect the same from her Greek memories... (Szabó Magda: Zeusz küszöbén)

There is no better way to travel than to travel with stories, and with people who have gone before you. Do you have favorite travel literature?

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Historical Fiction Authors

It's Top Ten Tuesday again, hosted over at The Broke and the Bookish! Go check out the blog hop, and join the fun!

Historical fiction seems somehow underrepresented these days. Or is it just me? A lot of what I see being talked about falls into the following categories:

1. Historical Romance
2. Historical YA lit
3. Historical fiction of specific popular eras - 20th century, mostly

While there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of these, I do have a lot of classic favorites that don't fall into any of the three. So, since this week's Top Ten Tuesday is YOUR PICK, I decided to make a list of my favorite historical fiction authors, the masters of the genre.
Here we go!

Mika Waltari
An undisputed god of historical fiction. I read Sinuhe on the beach when I was in middle school, and it left a print on my rib cage as I propped it up, but I could not put it down. Some parts of it gave me nightmares, and those were not even the parts about mummification. I also loved Turms the Immortal, and the Mikael and Mikael Hakim series.





Maurice Druon
His Accursed Kings series is insanely well researched. He knew all the details that were to know, down to what tapestry hung in what castle hall. He's been to the depths of archives and came out with an amazing series, likable characters, and even more likable villains. (His mythic fiction Zeus' Diary is also pretty fun)

Gene Wolfe
He is on this list for his Soldier in the Mist series. It is the most challenging historical fiction I have ever read, and I enjoyed the heck out of it. The narrator of the story has amnesia, 50 First Dates style: he forgets every night everything about himself. Hence, he writes a journal to remind himself what happened so far - and that's the journal we are reading. The book, accordingly, is inconsistent, often confusing, but full of genius "aha!" moments - and also Greek place names that have been translated to English, as an extra puzzle to Classics enthusiasts. It was a challenge to read and I loved it.

Henryk Sienkiewicz
Polish author of Quo Vadis (of old Hollywood fame) and other historical classics such as With Fire and Sword and Teutonic Knights. He wrote characters who well not without fault, but especially likable because of that, and great, big epic historical stories worth following through.

Graham Shelby
Remember that Kingdom of Heaven movie where Orlando Bloom pretended to be a blacksmith and Eva Green pretended to be slightly less terrifying than usual? Well, it was supposed to be based on Shelby's Knights of Dark Renown series, telling the story of the Crusades. Except the books are infinitely better, full of adventure and awkward love, and great storytelling.




Edward Rutherfurd
Unlike the others on the list, Rutherfurd is here for one book only: London. He wrote an awesome epic telling of the history of one city through dozens of generations of a handful of intertwined families - and then he tried to do it again and again and again, and repeated the success, but never the quality. I tried some of the other books, and gave up pretty fast. London is a masterpiece, though.

Robert Merle
I grew up reading his Fortunes of France series in Hungarian, and was excited to find out that they just started publishing them in English. Fortunes of France is a swashbuckling adventure through religious wars, court intrigue, and a great exciting time of French history, peppered with a cheeky roguish hero and a lot of gratuitous sex.

Mary Renault
I already mentioned her on my list last week: The lady took Greek historical fiction to a whole new level. In addition, she also wrote the most adorable, touching same-sex romance about Alexander the Great in The Persian Boy. My favorite of hers is The King Must Die in which she brought Minoan Crete to colorful and breathtaking life.





Robert Graves
I love Graves for so many reasons. While his work with mythology is criticized a lot in Classics, he knew how to lift mythology into historical fiction. My favorite book of his is probably The Golden Fleece, but he became most famous with I, Claudius (a book largely responsible for me ending up with a degree in Roman archaeology).

Bernard Cornwell
Also mentioned last week: He is a recent new favorite of mine for his Saxon Stories series. An extremely prolific author with a good sense of historical realities, and very likable, human characters. Also, the best battle descriptions I have read in a long time.

There you have my list. Do you have favorite historical fiction?

Top Ten Tuesday: Ten authors I REALLY want to meet

This is my first attempt at participating in Top Ten Tuesday, a blog hop for book and book related blogs. While I am not book related, I do love to read, and I have recently acquired a taste for blog hops.

This week's theme is Top Ten Authors I REALLY want to meet. Because some of my favorites are sadly not with us anymore, I broke my list down into two parts: 7 authors I hope to meet someday, and 3 authors that I hope to meet someday on another plane of existence.
Here we go (in no particular order):

Gerald Morris
The author of the Squire's Tales series, he is one of my favorite people. Not just because of his writing, but also because his stories are so full of empathy, and genuine love for the legends he adapts. I think we would have a lot of Arthurian nerdiness to talk about. I emailed with him briefly on behalf of a book festival a couple of years ago, and he seemed very friendly and fun.





Marissa Meyer
I only recently discovered her Lunar Chronicles series, and it was love at first read. Those books are a storyteller's dream (how many books do Easter eggs for fairy tale fanatics?!). She is very active on social media and seems like a nice person. There is a lot of love for her from the fandom, and she appreciates it.

Neil Gaiman
Yeah, I know, me and another three million people. I actually met him once, and we had lunch together with the Storytelling department at ETSU when he was on the Unchained Tour. He was very friendly and polite, and a great storyteller. I was so incredibly star-struck that I completely forgot to ask him to sign the book that was in my purse the entire time! My dad will never let me live that one down. I'm waiting for a second chance.

Christopher Moore
Lamb is probably one of my top 3 favorite books ever. And that's saying something, if you look at my Goodreads page... I went to his book signing in Ann Arbor last year, and he was both friendly and hilarious. I love that he mixes comedy with some serious research in pretty much all of his books. Also, he does Trickster right.

Bernard Cornwell
Also a recent discovery of mine, and I devoured all of his Saxon Stories series within a month. Since historical fiction is my home turf, I would love to meet with someone who does it so well, and takes it so seriously.

Bill Willingham
The author of Fables, my favorite comic book series. Another person that understands and appreciates the nature of stories, and adapts folk and fairy tales in all kinds of awesome ways. I really just want to have a conversation with him about stories over a cup of coffee or something.

Cory O'Brien
He just recently published his second book, but I have been following his blog for years now. Cory is the crazy genius behind Better Myths, a blog that re-tells mythology and legends in ways that will make you laugh until you turn purple. He is also the culprit behind the Internet-famous Norse Crisis Flowchart. My goal is to organize a MythOff one day and invite him as a featured teller.





Planned for the Afterlife:

Mark Twain
Since I have read pretty much every word he's ever written, it would only be fair to finally talk to the guy. Also, I would love to hear some of his mantelpiece bedtime stories.

Michael Ende
My first childhood reading love. Both Momo and The Neverending Story are on my top bookshelf with the classics (and yes, I hated The Neverending Story movies with a passion, because I only saw them after reading the book 10+ times) (also, they are horrible).

Mary Renault
Another role model for me. The proof that you can be a female author in historical fiction without having to do "historical romance" all over the place. She deals with some hardcore things in her books, and applies a lot of empathy and subtle humor to Greek history. Her The King Must Die is a masterpiece, and it was hugely responsible for me going into archaeology. Someone should turn it into a movie, like, right about now.