Possibly my favourite stories were The Tale of the Apple and The Tale of the Handkerchief. However, more important to me was the fact that we were given the chance to see the backgrounds of the witches and nasty stepmothers, who weren’t necessarily always bad. I found this feminist take on the tales interesting and liked the message of some of the stories. Their lives don’t end with living happily ever after, married to prince charming. All of the female characters have their own mind and make their own choices – often helped along by other women. The tales are wonderfully empowering to women. The thing that many readers have found particularly special about Kissing the Witch, is that everything is told from the female perspective. The readers are kept interested because they want to learn more about the character and understand why they have become a witch, a fairy Godmother or how they came to live a secluded life in a cave. Each tale is connected to the one before, with the secondary character from the first telling her own story, and then passing on the pen to the next woman. The further in you get, the more surprises you find. Reading this chain of stories is like opening a Russian doll. I read Kissing the Witch in two sittings because, although it’s a collection of short stories, I found it hard to put down. This review at Iris on Books caught my eye a few months ago and the book was added to my wish list straight away.
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