HOWL: Endings & Beginnings

Tag: anthologies

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Worlds Seen in Passing: Ten Years of Tor. Since it began in Tor. Its hundreds of […]. From Amy Reed, Ellen Hopkins, Amber Smith, Sandhya Menon, and more of your favorite YA authors comes an anthology of essays that explore the diverse experiences of injustice, empowerment, and growing up female in America. This collection of twenty-one essays […]. Fifteen bestselling and acclaimed authors reimagine the folklore and mythology of East and South Asia in short stories that are by turns enchanting, heartbreaking, romantic, and passionate.

This collection consists of 15 original, mostly contemporary, tales that are retellings of myths and legends, focused on ghosts, star-crossed lovers and angry spirits, heroes and deities, combined with modern aspects of our societies, e. While the human need for revenge and love and understanding lies behind the tales, the writing is choppy, uninspiring.

Turning traditional tales into naive stories about bots or teenage vampires results in ridiculing the subject matter. Following each tale, there is a note from each writer, explaining their inspiration behind the story. A look in their biographies answered my question.

Not really Pulitzer-worthy material. The stories that saved the book from being an unexpected DNF were: A sad tale from the Philippines. She is a peculiar exorcist who continues the work of her late mother. Once a year, the ghosts need to eat in order for their soul to rest in peace. They walk among the living, waiting A beautiful story whose roots lie in the vast Chinese tradition. The Land of the Morning Calm: A beautiful story of a family who tries to cope with a sudden, tragic loss. Korean traditions are paired with the strange world of RPG in a tale of motherhood, obsession with an artificial world and the need to move on.

A tale of love, war and loss. Based on a well-known Chinese legend of star-crossed lovers. In my opinion, the weakest moments in the collection were the stories based on the Hindu traditions. Not this, whatever it was. For example, the story Spear Carrier is supposedly inspired by the epic Mahabharata and it is an abomination. To my extreme disappointment, this was an extremely uneven collection with very few gems in an attempt to salvage a collection that could have been glorious. Instead, it was barely passable. I definitely suggest you give it a try, though. Having read tons of short stories collection based on myths and traditions, written with quality and taste and not like scribbles for a Nickelodeon TV series, this one appeared to me frightfully average.

My reviews can also be found on https: View all 10 comments. We would have been overjoyed to have found this anthology, filled with characters with skin and hair and names more like ours, in our beloved libraries. I have been so excited about this collection ever since I first heard about it. Ellen Oh is a wonderful woman you may know her as one of the co-founders of the WeNeedDiverseBooks movement!

I lov We would have been overjoyed to have found this anthology, filled with characters with skin and hair and names more like ours, in our beloved libraries. I love retellings, but more than anything, I was obsessed with the idea of this collection being written singlehandedly by Asian authors, writing Asian stories. Honestly, this is the kind of diverse representation we need more of in the bookish world! What a stunning introduction to the collection!

The writing felt so reminiscent of a classic, old myth or legend, in all the best ways, and I only wish it could have been longer! This did not disappoint at all. It not only displays the importance of remembering and honoring your ancestors and culture, but it also offers a brutally honest look into how it feels to mourn a lost loved one.

I cried through probably half of this story, and now I just want to go hug my mom, but kudos to Alyssa for breaking my heart in the sweetest possible way, as usual. I thought it was a little bit jumpy and would have benefited from being about twice as long and having room for more explanation of what was happening to the girls. This story was so sweet, and sad, and precious.

Sun revisits the game and finds a familiar spirit trapped therein. Not only is it a sweet reunion story, and a gorgeously modernized folklore retelling, but it also presented an interesting view into both sides of a popular debate: This reads so beautifully like old folklore, with a brilliant young dancer who has found herself trapped in an unhappy relationship with a jealous prince.

Here There Be Spoilers

The depiction of the courtesan was so brave and empowering, and there was an incredibly authentic feeling in the darkness of the tale as she was forced to choose between her freedom or her life. We were here to dance. This installment was fun in that it paralleled the original story and the retelling, one piece at a time; on the one hand, we had the infamous Hindu legend of the battle between Durga and Mahishasura, while on the other, we had a story of three young girls celebrating Navaratri and seeking revenge on a rude boy from their community.

I enjoyed how heavily inspired the story clearly was by the legend, and I liked how heavy-handed the Hindu references were I had to look some of them up, admittedly, but it was a great opportunity to learn more about the religion and celebration. I genuinely hoped that I would not be 1-starring a single story in this collection, but this was awful. The stream-of-consciousness writing is not well done, the narrator comes across as very juvenile, and there are some downright insensitive quips about people who die for others or for the furthering of knowledge and science.

I recently read a short story by this author that I adored, so I hoped I would love this, too, but this was definitely not my cup of tea.

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This story was breathtakingly beautiful, and so sad. When Liang is awaiting his station, he dresses as a girl to visit the factory, and falls in love with a young woman therein. The writing in this piece is so powerful, and I loved every word of it. This is such a gorgeous story, but more than anything, I loved the fact that, despite having been inspired by a mix of two stories instead of one, I could absolutely feel the resemblance to the Mahabharata.

My favorite stories in this collection have mostly been the ones that felt like folklore to me, and this one is a shining example of that. Throughout the story, I kept thinking about how much I would adore a full novel or even novella extension of this little masterpiece. Julie Kagawa is another author in this collection whose work had been on my TBR for a while, so I was particularly excited about this story, and it definitely did not disappoint.

Thank you so much to Greenwillow Books for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review! You can find this review and more on my blog , or you can follow me on twitter , bookstagram , or facebook! A Thousand Beginnings and Endings is a collection of short stories that re-imagine South and East Asian myths, penned by fifteen authors tasked with representing their culture.

While the myths themselves are interesting, the re-tellings lack sparkle. Halfway through the book, the only alluring tale is found in its opening pages: Chokshi conveys a bittersweet tale of love and heartache with colorful prose, though the moral of the story is delivered clumsily. Oct 17, Natalie Monroe rated it really liked it Shelves: Her Talon series crashed and burned, she'll always have a special place in my heart due to The Iron Fey series.

To my surprise, I found myself enjoying the other stories just as much, some even more. Anthologies are always a bit of a mixed bag, so I'm going to review them individually: It's about a semi-forbidden romance between a mortal and a diwata mountain spirit. The writing is lush and just the right amount of purple. It has very distinct The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic feel, which I love.

I'm Chinese and live in Hong Kong. Even though the theme is familial and revolves around coping with loss, it failed to make an emotional impact on me, partially because I'm too close to it in a way. There is another Chinese-inspired tale in this anthology that I quite liked though, so maybe it's not my thing. Only a chaotic set of images and sounds, but vivid, like neon scripts streaming across a black screen. Steel Skin takes place in the future where androids have been banned because they gained sentience and rebelled.

The protagonist suspects her dad has been replaced by an android. The what-it-means-to-be-human plot is old and tired, this story was just too short to really do anything with it or hit the right emotional notes. Still Star-Crossed by Sona Charaipotha — 2. Taara meets a beautiful, seductive stranger who seems to recognize her. It could have been longer because it ends abruptly without any closure. The Counting of Vermillion Beads is a beautiful story of sisterhood.

Tam and Cam are forcibly escorted from their village to be census girls for the palace. One night, trying to climb over the wall and escape, Tam falls and transforms into a bird. The Land of the Morning Calm by E. The Land of the Morning Calm is a multiplayer RPG that the protagonist's mom used to play all the time before she suddenly passed away. Like Olivia's Table, it's a story about grief and moving on. It dives into gaming culture too.

Gimme your feminist fairytale retellings. Saeed weaves a gorgeous narrative about freedom and choices with a peasant girl-turned-courtesan and the prince who invited her to the palace after he saw her dance.

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A South Asian folktale. It's just really silly. Three girls team up to punish a rude boy, which parallels Navratri, a Hindu holiday. It's based on a myth that champions the physical manifestation of divine female energy to defeat a demon. Inspired by a Korean fairy tale called The Goblin Treasure, a sister is granted three wishes by goblins, but her jealous brother plots to steal it.

Sibling rivalry is a traditional fairytale framework, though here it works perfectly. It didn't make me feel much though. A South Asian epic. This Filipino-inspired tale touches on immigrants—an aswang vampire travels to America to flee prosecution in the Philippines.

Books & Writing

Bullet, Butterfly is a retelling of one of the most famous Chinese folktales, the Butterfly Lovers. They are kept apart by familial duty. Here, Liang disguises himself as a girl and sneaks into the armory for a bet, but ends up falling for Zhu, one of the workers there. A queer romance along the lines of Mulan. It's set in modern times yet has a strong fairytale vibe. Maybe it's the purple-drenched writing—a girl with a heart that glows like the sun who falls for a boy with a heart as silver as the moon. Based on a South Asian epic called Mahabharata.

The star-crossed lovers are only allowed to meet on the seventh day of the seventh month each year when a bridge of magpies form the Milky Way. Pon puts a fresh spin on it by granting the usually silent weaver girl her own voice and reshapes certain events. I seriously need to pick up one of her novels soon. Eyes Like Candlelight by Julie Kagawa — 3. Ironically, I didn't like it as much as a few of the others mentioned.

Nonetheless it's an enjoyable read with all the elements I've come to anticipate from Kagawa's work—solid writing and a forbidden romance between a mortal and a supernatural being. In this case, it's the well-known kitsune which appears time and time again in Japanese popular culture.

Ultimately, there were highs, there were lows. But the highs are worth it. ARC provided by Edelweiss My heart is full. Greenwillow Books Publication Date: June 26, Rating: Review copy sent by the publisher Summary from 5 stars. Review copy sent by the publisher Summary from Goodreads: Star-crossed lovers, meddling immortals, feigned identities, battles of wits, and dire warnings: This anthology has to be one of my favorites of all time.

I've read several anthologies over the years, and I think this one is quite possibly one of the best that YA authors have to offer. I was introduced to many new Asian myths and legends, but also recognized some of the South Asian ones. I'm incredibly proud to see an anthology of Asian stories, written by Asian authors. This is the ownvoices representation that YA - and lit in general - needs.

I read the stories but I'm only going to highlight a few, which were my favorite. You won't need much convincing, trust me. All of these authors are true storytellers, with excellent writing. Regardless, these authors all have fantastic stories to tell. This anthology contains retellings of Asian myths and legends. It is structured such that the retelling is presented, and then in the page after the story's end, the author gives a little background information about the original legend s.

This was really cool, because I didn't know about most of the legends, and reading the retellings made me want to know more. Below are some of my favorites. Please note that all of these stories are worth reading. I just really want to gush about these in particular. If I discussed all of them, this would be a very long and boring review if it isn't already!

In this retelling, the Mountain falls in love with a human male, and loses her heart to him. It ends up being a tragic story, and in quite a heartbreaking way. I found the retelling absolutely fascinating, and the legend itself was quite intriguing as well. Roshani Chokshi has a way of weaving a story together. There was a quiet lull to this story, and then things escalated in the final pages. Amazing story, lush writing, fascinating legend. If there is one thing I know about Indian lore in general, it is the fascination with star-crossed lovers.

You see it in old-school Bollywood movies all the time! I say "old-school" and refer to basically anything pre The legend involves Sahiba who falls in love with Mirza, a famed archer, but she is to marry a stranger. On the night of her arranged wedding, she runs off with Mirza. But the tale doesn't end there, and I won't spoil it. The retelling is set in modern times, with Taara at a dance in the beginning of the story.

Taara meets a boy who calls her Soni and claims to know her, but she has never seen him before. Still, something tugs her to him. This story ends like I expected - the twist is somewhat predictable especially if you're familiar with the culture or old tales.

Find Me Elsewhere

But I loved this story. There was something so familiar about it to me - both the original legend, and the retelling. The retelling is a little different from the original story - in that it binds together two potential versions of the original story.

The original legend is very old and there are several interpretations to the story. This in itself was really cool. But in any case, I loved the retelling. The heroine is a courtesan to a prince, and the prince is so in love with her. But the courtesan knows that while she adores the prince, she does not love him, and her life is completely controlled by him, even if she is not a prisoner.

One smile of hers breaks the illusion and she realizes just how little control of her life that she actually has. The ending of this story is actually really "happy" and I loved it. I was completely hooked on this story and I was rooting for one thing, but then I realized that I wanted the story to end differently. This was such a cool story and I love that the author chose to retell such an old one, and made it her own. I feel like I've said that several times now, in this review. The retelling is the story of Charan and her young brother Chun. Charan and Chun visit the forest often, because they've seen goblins.

They'd been doing this since they were children. They got older, and Charan is getting ready to leave her family to go to music school, even though she has caught the eye of a young man in the village, and the match would be advantageous for the family. Chun is not happy about this, because he thinks his sister is being selfish by not staying the village and going through with the match.

One day, Charan falls through a hole and meets the goblins. They give her an enchanted club and two wishes. Chun, in a fit of jealousy, steals the club and goes to meet the goblins. All he wants is what is best for his family, unlike what he thinks his sister wants. But things do not end the way Chun wants them to. You'll have to read the story to see what happened. The original legend a Korean fairy tale is called The Goblin Treasure and it involved two brothers, one with a good soul and one with a disquiet soul.

It is based on The Mahabharata, which is the longest epic poem in recorded history. One of the tales is that of Princess Savitri and Prince Satyavan, and this is where the author's retelling comes from. The retelling is slightly different from the original story. In the retelling Savitri saves Satyavan, a cursed so of Chandra, the lunar lord. But even though she saved him from death, Satyavan is on borrowed time. Still, Savitri brings him back and they get to know each other.

anthologies – howling libraries

But Satyavan remembers nothing of his near-death, or even his being a son of the lunar lord. He knows nothing but Savitri. What happens when his borrowed time is up? You'll have to read the story to find out. This was a heartbreaking and also very lovely story. And surprisingly, the ending was very positive. I love the themes that the author wove into the story.

I also loved the romance. With short stories, oftentimes the romance is tragic or nonexistent. The romance in this story was lovely. What I Did Not Like: Nothing to say here! Would I Recommend It: I highly recommend this anthology, whether you read YA or not, whether you're Asian or not. Many of these tales read like fiction not specifically YA fiction , so I'd encourage adult fiction readers to check out the book. My heart was so full, to see these authors and these cultures represented. But my heart was even more full when I read these stories and was swept away by the amazing tales and lovely storytelling.

These authors wrote some quality stories. Don't just read this book because it's an Asian-written anthology of Asian stories although, that's an excellent reason to read the anthology, don't get me wrong ; read the book because the stories are incredible. My hat goes off to Ellen Oh and Elsie Chapman for putting together this project.

And of course to the amazing authors who came up with these stories. I didn't grow up seeing many South Asian MG or YA stories in the library, and to see so many in this anthology was heartwarming. View all 5 comments. My full review can be found on my, The Quiet Pond. Reading A Thousand Beginnings and Endings is, quite frankly, a dream come true for me. Growing up, I never read mythology or stories about my culture - apart from the occasional viewing of Sun Wukong or Mulan. So, not only was reading this anthology validating, it was also gave me a sense of relief because, with this book, Asian teenagers, adults, and children alike will be able to read stories about them and that have characters that are like the My full review can be found on my, The Quiet Pond.

So, not only was reading this anthology validating, it was also gave me a sense of relief because, with this book, Asian teenagers, adults, and children alike will be able to read stories about them and that have characters that are like them. Thank you so much to the writers and the editors of this anthology, for putting these stories together, for retelling stories from our cultures, giving them a voice, and for putting a little piece of you in these stories too.

I cannot wait to share this anthology with all my other Asian friends, and to pass these stories onto my children one day. Some stories were for me, some were not - but true for all stories is that each story has a little piece of the writer in it. To me, that is so special and transcends a simple rating. My heart felt so full after reading each. Aug 03, Delirious Disquisitions rated it really liked it Shelves: A Thousand Beginnings and Endings is a collection of short stories or retelling of lesser known Asian folktales and mythologies.

Written by Asian writers, the stories cover a wide variety of genres such as sci-fi, fantasy, horror, etc. But there is also an overall theme of loneliness, melancholy, identity crisis, filial piety, and morality connecting these stories. I had a hard time reading through t A Thousand Beginnings and Endings is a collection of short stories or retelling of lesser known Asian folktales and mythologies.

I had a hard time reading through this collection. There are some really terrible stories in here. But the brilliant ones sprinkled among the bad are really worth it! Below is a breakdown of my individual ratings without giving away any spoilers: This is a story of forbidden love and heartbreak. I thought the ending was a little abrupt, but maybe that was just me wishing we would linger within the story a little more. The story is very atmospheric with a lingering sense of melancholy, loss, and love permeating throughout.

Of all the stories in this collection, this is one that affected me the most. I really hate reading South Asian stories when they are written for a western audience. This one is a classic example. It did not feel genuine or sincere to me and honestly I cringed through the whole thing. As the beautiful title suggests, this one is just a wonderful story full of imagination, poetic language, and alluring imagery. By focusing on the sisterly dynamic the author gave the characters more depth and nuance than the original source material. It does tend to get a little bit weird and confusing at times though, specially for those not familiar with the story.

I appreciate how the author translated these classic characters into their contemporary gaming counterparts. However, I just wish we had more of an immersive take on one or two mythical figures instead of a mismatch of famous story characters. Mughal-e-Azam has on nothing on Aisha Saeed who so lovely crafted this story and its central character with the sort of depth and nuance that we seldom get to see of a court dancer.

I loved this rendition of the story and really wish this could have been a full length novel. Although very detailed and distinctive in its mood, the story felt a little rushed due to length constraints. But that is a minor grievance compared to how much I loved this story!

Now this is how you do a retelling of a South Asian story. The story alternates between its mythological roots and the contemporary celebration of the festival. I liked the mythological parts well enough. As it stands, the contemporary bits were just too childish, equating divinity and justice to a petty revenge and morality tale. Korean Goblin mythology retold as a traditional myth with a moral. It's one of those classic fables about the consequences of selfishness and the price of magic. Underlying is the story of siblings and familial bonds. I really wish I knew what the sister used for her last wish though.

Another contemporary retelling of a South Asian story, this time it's the epic Mahabharata. Ambitious and entirely unnecessary. Told in first person narrative style, which is fun till you are stuck in the mind of a condescending, douchebag, fake woke asshole. It was entirely too long, and utterly boring to boot.

There was just so much detail and inner monologue that could have just been edited out. Or a book about a vampire chick who doesn't get riled up by puny humans! Can we please have some badassery here? Melissa de la Cruz took these horrific creatures and defanged them! All in an attempt to somehow connect this to her Blue Blood series. Unoriginal and just plain lame. Twist on the classic Chinese tale of forbidden love in a war ravaged time. I just fell in love with this story.

It is beautifully written, deeply evocative, and powerful in its simplicity. This is where I document my reading life and other book culture. Keep turning the page. Beginnings and endings tend to get the most attention in book reviews. The opening sentence certainly piqued my interest:. Sophie Hatter is one such unlucky eldest of three and it is her plight on which the book focuses. Almost immediately, Sophie is bewitched with an aging spell and unable to tell anyone that she is actually much younger than her year-old visage would lead them to believe.

She sees no choice but to seek the help of the wizard Howl, whose mobile castle is drifting not far from her town. Once inside the castle, Sophie quickly realizes there is much more to Howl than his predatory reputation. Together with Calcifer the fire demon, Michael the apprentice, Sophie's sisters, Howl's love interests plural and multiple other minor characters, Sophie and Howl strike out against the Witch of the Waste to free the kingdom.

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