The orphan's tales.

In the Night Garden

Paperback, 496 pages

English language

Published Nov. 6, 2006 by Bantam Books.

ISBN:
978-0-553-38403-1
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5 stars (1 review)

A Book of Wonders for Grown-Up ReadersEvery once in a great while a book comes along that reminds us of the magic spell that stories can cast over us--to dazzle, entertain, and enlighten. Welcome to the Arabian Nights for our time--a lush and fantastical epic guaranteed to spirit you away from the very first page....Secreted away in a garden, a lonely girl spins stories to warm a curious prince: peculiar feats and unspeakable fates that loop through each other and back again to meet in the tapestry of her voice. Inked on her eyelids, each twisting, tattooed tale is a piece in the puzzle of the girl's own hidden history. And what tales she tells! Tales of shape-shifting witches and wild horsewomen, heron kings and beast princesses, snake gods, dog monks, and living stars--each story more strange and fantastic than the one that came before. From ill-tempered "mermaid" to fastidious …

4 editions

Review of "The orphan's tales." on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I loved this baffling, bedazzling book of tales within tales within tales. The book has a framework of a young girl with mysterious ink around her eyes hiding in a garden by an undefined sultan's palace. The sultan's young son meets the girl and learns that the ink are stories that the girl knows, and so he makes her tell him two tales. The first tale is about a prince who kills the daughter of a witch, the second tale is about a girl as pale as snow living in an icy city. But both tales are like Russian dolls, nested within them are tales within tales within tales as the reader gets to meet gods that used to be stars, mystical creatures like the Leucrotta, opulent cities like Al-A-Nur, demons and necromancers. The two tales are actually sharing narrative strands. Sometimes it's a bit difficult to follow when picking …

Subjects

  • American Science Fiction And Fantasy
  • Fiction
  • Fiction - Fantasy
  • Fantasy
  • Fantasy - Epic
  • Fiction / Fantasy / General
  • Fantasy - General
  • Fantasy fiction