A Wild Swan - by Michael Cunningham (Hardcover)
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<p/><br></br><p><b> About the Book </b></p></br></br>"A twisted retelling of classic fairy tales from the novelist Michael Cunningham."--<p/><br></br><p><b> Book Synopsis </b></p></br></br><p><b>Fairy tales for our times from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of </b><i><b>The Hours<br></b><br></i>A poisoned apple and a monkey's paw with the power to change fate; a girl whose extraordinarily long hair causes catastrophe; a man with one human arm and one swan's wing; and a house deep in the forest, constructed of gumdrops and gingerbread, vanilla frosting and boiled sugar. In <i>A Wild Swan and Other Tales</i>, the people and the talismans of lands far, far away--the mythic figures of our childhoods and the source of so much of our wonder--are transformed by Michael Cunningham into stories of sublime revelation. <br> Here are the moments that our fairy tales forgot or deliberately concealed: the years after a spell is broken, the rapturous instant of a miracle unexpectedly realized, or the fate of a prince only half cured of a curse. The Beast stands ahead of you in line at the convenience store, buying smokes and a Slim Jim, his devouring smile aimed at the cashier. A malformed little man with a knack for minor acts of wizardry goes to disastrous lengths to procure a child. A loutish and lazy Jack prefers living in his mother's basement to getting a job, until the day he trades a cow for a handful of magic beans.<br> Reimagined by one of the most gifted storytellers of his generation, and exquisitely illustrated by Yuko Shimizu, rarely have our bedtime stories been this dark, this perverse, or this true.</p><p/><br></br><p><b> Review Quotes </b></p></br></br><br><p>Delicious, shivery, sophisticated fairy stories as spat from the pen of a Pulitzer Prize-winning author. 'Most of us are safe, ' Cunningham writes in his astonishing preface. 'If you're not a delirious dream the gods are having, if your beauty doesn't trouble the constellations, nobody's going to cast a spell on you.' But Cunningham will, and does. In a market oversaturated by reworked fairy tales, his are the best. --Katy Waldman, <i>Slate</i> <p/>[<i>A Wild Swan</i> is] positively delectable. I had no idea Mr. Cunningham had it in him . . . He can't help but write movingly, even as he's setting fire to our most cherished childhood texts. The book is studded with unexpected moments of grace. --Jennifer Senior, <i>The New York Times</i> <p/>Five out of five stars. While there was darkness in the original tales--blood, butchery and much else--Cunningham's collection brings emotional light and shade where there was none . . . The comedy in these stories works brilliantly, but it does not uncut the tragedy of its lonely and quietly tormented outsiders . . . These tales, short, contemporary, disturbing, and alluring, would make perfect vending-machine fodder: a transporting and enthralling read all the way home. --Arifa Akbar, <i>The Independent</i> <p/>Michael Cunningham and Yuko Shimizu's <i>A Wild Swan </i>is an enchantment. --Alissa Schappell, <i>Vanity Fair<br></i><br>[Cunningham] has reimagined, and wickedly modernized, a batch of fairy tales (Yuko Shimizu's illustrations resemble the work of Aubrey Beardsley.) . . . Readers will savor Cunningham's wise, generous musings about (superbly) recognizable types. --Joan Frank, <i>San Francisco Chronicle</i> <p/>'I dig out beautiful caves behind my characters, ' [Virginia] Woolf wrote in the diary entry Cunningham used as an epigraph to <i>The Hours</i>: 'I think that's exactly what I want: humanity, humor, depth.' Cunningham has performed a similar operation on the 10 tales he has selected for transformation . . . For the stories in <i>A Wild Swan</i>, Cunningham has dug out caves of humanity, humor and depth behind some well-known characters. --Christopher Benfey, <i>The New York Times Book Review</i> <p/>A rollicking and memorable tribute to stories we know.. . . [Cunningham's] prose brings back much of the original swagger and sharpness. . . . [He] is extremely funny and psychologically observant. . . . Beautiful, imaginative illustrations by Yuko Shimizu, complement the stories, spurring the feeling that this is not just a book to read, but also a special object." --<i>The Economist</i> <p/>"Remixing myths and fairy tales in this new collection - beautifully illustrated by Yuko Shimizu - Cunningham stands magic on its head. . . . Cunningham never condescends to his characters. Instead, he inhabits them." --Kit Reed, <i>Miami Herald</i> <p/>The original tales are timeless for good reasons, and by approaching them from a fresh and astute perspective with humor and compassion, Cunningham revitalizes their profound resonance. Imaginatively illustrated by Yuko Shimizu, this is a dazzling twenty-first-century fairy-tale collection of creative verve and keen enchantment. Cunningham's high stature and the book's irresistible premise will attract lively media attention and reader curiosity. --Donna Seaman, <i>Booklist</i> <p/>The latest from Cunningham (<i>The Snow Queen</i>) offers elegant, sardonic retellings of 10 iconic fairy tales . . . Cunningham's tales enlarge rather than reduce the haunting mystery of their originals. Striking black-and-white images from illustrator Shimizu add a fitting visual counterpoint to a collection at once dark and delightful. --<i>Publishers Weekly</i></p><br><p/><br></br><p><b> About the Author </b></p></br></br><p><b>Michael Cunningham</b> is the author of seven novels, including <i>A Home at the End of the World</i>, <i>Flesh and Blood</i>, <i>The Hours</i> (winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize), <i>Specimen Days</i>, and <i>By Nightfall</i>, as well as <i>Land's End</i>: <i>A Walk in Provincetown</i>. He lives in New York. <p/><b>Yuko Shimizu</b> is a Japanese illustrator based in New York, whose work has been featured in <i>Time</i>, <i>Newsweek</i>, <i>The New York Times</i>, and <i>The New Yorker</i>. Her first self-titled monograph was released from Gestalten in 2011; her first children's book illustrations appeared in <i>Barbed Wire Baseball, </i>written by Marissa Moss. Shimizu teaches illustration at the School of Visual Arts.</p>
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