The Serpent Slayer: and Other Stories of Strong Women in Into the Forest

Mar 21, 2010 Hazel rated it liked it

Shelves: fantasy, recommended-for-meredith

I've just read this quickly before sending it to my niece. I'm disappointed that the prose doesn't sparkle. Tchana is a pedestrian stylist and there are certainly better-written folktales. But the content is fabulous. The 'princesses' are bright, curious, patient, physically courageous, thoughtful, assertive girls; heroines every one. There's a canny old woman who outwits the the devil, and a poor peasant girl who stands up to the king. I'm particularly pleased that there are many black/brown gi ...more

10 likes · Like · see review

Jul 09, 2009 Mir rated it it was amazing

Shelves: picture, short-stories, mythology

Hyman's illustrations are wonderful, as always. The stories selected are often relatively obscure ones, which was a great change from the famous few that get told over and over. The text is substantial and perfectly suitable for teens and adults as well as children. The volume is large and heavier than the standard picture book, so smaller children may find it a bit hard to hold on their own. ...more

7 likes · Like · see review

May 18, 2017 Katie J Schwartz rated it really liked it

Shelves: suspend-reality, childrens-lit, visual-storytelling, mythology-folklore, fairy-tales, feminism, short-stories, dragon-hoard, kickass-ladies, fey-creatures

A review of The Serpent Slayer: And Other Stories of Strong Young Women by Katrin Hyman Tchana and Trina Schart Hyman:

Content = AWESOME

This collection of stories is actually diverse. There are girls from a wide variety of cultures represented.

The Barber's Wife (Indian)

Grandmother's Skull (Native American)

The Magic Lake (Latin American)

And it's not just stories about young women, either:

The Old Woman and the Devil (Middle Eastern)

Illustrations = AWESOME

Lots of different representations of beauty ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Feb 02, 2016 Leah rated it really liked it

Retold by Katrin Hyman Tchana, daughter of the collection's illustrator, Caldecott Medal winner Trina Schart Hyman.

"This book is a collection of fairy tales that are -- sort of -- from around the world. Sort of, because there aren't stories here from every country in the world or even every continent."

What I loved most about The Serpent Slayer and Other Stories of Strong Women was how colorful it was: both its illustrations and its heroes. Compared to Not One Damsel in Distress: World Folktales ...more

Like · see review

Jan 13, 2025 SBC marked it as tr-openlibrary-ss

Shelves: g-fairy-and-folk-tales, f-short-story

This features 18 retold fairytales. Retold by Katrin Tchana and illustrated by her mother.

Preface - There were some lovely thoughts here: "The stories in this collection are about women and girls who find themselves in difficult circumstances and respond in brave, clever, and thoughtful ways ... We believe we need more books that reflect that [women's] experience [of life]. These are stories that remind us how to be strong, adventuresome, creative women. They teach us how to survive enormous suf This features 18 retold fairytales. Retold by Katrin Tchana and illustrated by her mother.

Preface - There were some lovely thoughts here: "The stories in this collection are about women and girls who find themselves in difficult circumstances and respond in brave, clever, and thoughtful ways ... We believe we need more books that reflect that [women's] experience [of life]. These are stories that remind us how to be strong, adventuresome, creative women. They teach us how to survive enormous suffering and come out alive with our eyes shining and our feet kicking... so that people everywhere remember the courage, strength, ingenuity, and intelligence that is every woman's heritage."

1) The Serpent Slayer - 3 stars. I really enjoyed the way this story was told. A serpent becomes a problem for a village, and the sorcerer called by the magistrate for help comes up with the solution of offering it a young girl once a year to eat. After 9 sacrifices, Li Chi turns 14 and offers to go, intending to end the beast and therefore this terrible arrangement.

2) The Barber's Wife - 2 stars. I didn't enjoy this story so much. The barber's wife, Amarjit, wasn't as honourable a character as Li Chi. She makes the most of situations but through trickery, and I didn't respect her as a character. Her husband is vain and foolish, but I couldn't help but think that she must have been a little the same to have married him. She loses her temper a lot, and appears to take pleasure in the suffering of the thieves.

3) Nesoowa and the Chenoo- 4 stars. This was a lovely story of how kindness can transform the hardest of hearts. Nesoowa and her husband Tomas go hunting in the North Woods where Chenoo (monstrous humans who turned mad due to their evil deeds and are now cannibals) live. When one comes to get Nesoowa she greets him as her father and cares for him. This trick becomes a long-term thing and the Chenoo, Elaak, doesn't seem evil. When the time comes for him to battle another Chenoo, and Toma and Nesoowa have the means to kill him and escape, they wonder if there is not another way. Magic, from the Great Spirit Glooscap, helps them.

4) Clever Marcela - 4 stars. At one point in this story Marcela is described as 'saucy' and I think that's the perfect description for her. I enjoyed reading about the clever battle of wits between her and the king, and how it fueled both romance and good sense. This was a fun and satisfying story. 4 stars

5) Sister Lace - 4 stars. This story couldn't be more different from the previous one. In this story, an Emperor covets a village girl because of her skill with lace, but she refuses to even consider marrying him. He sets her impossible tasks - to make a live rooster out of lace, then a live partridge, then a live dragon - and she succeeds because she works from the heart, and her heart is focused on her love of making lace and of sharing it with the world.

6) The Rebel Princess - 3 stars. This was a very unusual story. At the crux of it is a young couple, Judith and Zev, a princess and a prince of different kingdoms who studied together and fell in love, but weren't able to marry because Judith's father was blocking their way. They run away together, but when stopped on an island, lose each other. Judith then causes a fair amount of trouble for men that fall instantly in love with her (a merchant's son, a king, pirates, another king...). She becomes a pirate captain and then a king herself, before finally being reunited with Zev and making amends to the merchant's son who was banished and the king who was deposed because of her tricks. The ending somewhat makes up for some of the harshness of the earlier parts of the story.

7) Beebyeebyee and the Water God - 3 stars. Beebyeebyee is a strong young woman who doesn't want to be bound by the rules. She goes to fish for herself one day and meets and marries a water god who treats her well and gives her enough fish for the village. But the jealous fishermen spread rumours about her and then kill her husband. The ending felt rather abrupt to me - the water god's brother avenges him by flooding every house in the village except Beebyeebyee's. It felt a sort of weak revenge and grim ending. I would have liked to see Beebyeebyee leaving the village and starting out somewhere new and better.

8) Kate Crackernuts - 4 stars. I liked that this was a story of stepsisters who loved each other, despite the evil stepmother's machinations, and that the heroine is the 'ugly' stepsister. Of course Kate is not ugly - but her mother, who marries the king, is jealous that his daughter Anne is prettier. She arranges for Anne's head to be replaced with the head of a sheep. Kate takes pity on Anne and leads the 2 of them out to seek their fortunes. They come to a kingdom where a prince is sick and exhausted. His problem is a male version of the 12 Dancing Princesses - each night he goes to the fairy hill and dances all night. Kate likes to collect nuts and crack them and finds the solution to her sister's problem and her future husband's too. A fun story. ...more

Like · see review