There is a little brick house in an isolated valley in deepest Wales. To this idyllic retreat come Eloise and Simon, a young couple escaping the city. Eloise has led the way, inspired by the teachings of her muse, Moonbird, who holds that Mother Nature looks with benign concern upon her human children and sees to their well-being. At first all is well for Eloise and Simon and their cat M'sieu. Eloise spends her days sewing old-fashioned night dresses and petticoats which she sells to an exclusive shop in town; Simon does woodworking and odd jobs for the nearby farmers. The garden, the woods, the hills, the silence are all as Moonbird had promised. Or almost. For one day, four men, incongruously dressed in city suits and street shoes and carrying briefcases, walk up the country lane to the little house, and things begin to happen. Uncanny, inexplicable things. Things even Eloise's mother, Clare, and Clare's best friend, Miriam, who arrive from London, can't make heads or tails of. The two older women bicker and fuss, trying to decipher the younger woman's increasingly strange behavior. And then Eloise returns from a walk in the woods with a baby in her arms...
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Imagine Rumpelstiltskin, Snow White, and Morgan Le Fey folded into one story and you'll have some idea of Alice Thomas Ellis's quirky novel, Fairy Tale. Set in the wooded hills and remote valleys of Wales, Ellis's modern-day romance follows the fortunes of young Eloise and her paramour, Simon, as they leave promising careers in London behind and adopt, instead, a rural life. Simon, who had a future in advertising, becomes a woodworker, while Eloise makes her living sewing chic clothing out of old lace. Despite their idyllic surroundings, Eloise is beginning to feel bored by the quiet life--so much so that she wishes for a baby to give her life purpose. Be careful what you wish for, Eloise--the magic begins when four mysterious men appear in Eloise's garden just as she pricks her finger with a needle, dripping a drop of blood onto her white lace. Before you can say "Magic Mirror on the Wall," all kinds of fey events begin to happen: Eloise disappears on long walks in the woods, one time emerging bone dry from a stroll in a rainstorm, another time returning home with a mysterious green-eyed, silver-haired baby.
Readers will understand that the characters in this novel are not what they seem far sooner than Eloise and Simon do; nevertheless, half the fun in this moonstruck novel is Ellis's juxtaposition of her oblivious human characters with her all-too-aware--and slightly scary--fairy ones. Light, slightly satirical, impeccably written, this is one Fairy Tale meant for adults.
From Publishers Weekly
Strange goings-on in the Welsh countryside lie at the center of Booker Prize-nominee Alice Thomas Ellis's Fairy Tale, a "supernatural comedy of manners" first published in 1996 in the U.K. Young Eloise's rural ennui is broken by intrusions from the spirit world, including the appearance of four mysterious men in black, a changeling child and the ability to walk in a rainstorm without getting wet. Unbeknownst to her and her boyfriend, Simon, they are the intruders in a land ruled by the Kings of the Heights. A pleasantly diverting take on an old genre, this is perhaps too self-consciously quirky to grab a large U.S. audience.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ellis is superb.,
This review is from: Fairy Tale (Paperback)
I have read only four of her books, but each one is a masterpiece. Once again Ellis creates an uncanny brilliant story, best described as 'supernatural comedy of manners'. The spiteful interactions of all her characters are spot on and funny. This is combined with the eerie story of being attacked by the fairy folk. Excellent authoress, excellent book.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Contains a Scene of Superb Comic Genius,
By
This review is from: Fairy Tale (Common Reader's Alice Thomas Ellis) (Paperback)
There are some comic moments in novels that I never forget and that make me smile and laugh when I recall them. This novel has one of those great moments in it. Part of the fun of the novel is in the slow move from realism to the supernatural. The story begins with a couple trying to make a living on a small farm in Wales. The novel's beautiful descriptions of Wales, of the quaint cottage, and the picture-postcard romance of the young couple's country life lull us into the fantasy of a return to older days and times when country people believed in fairies. The strange happenings in the Welsh countryside begin simply, and we are slowly sucked into the weird, eerie atmosphere of the novel. The addition of two wordly women to farming couple's life adds more tensions as social values clash. Humor and social satire increase along with the tension until you reach a most magnificent climax and enjoyable denoument.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"I'm sick of the smell of fresh air.",
By
This review is from: Fairy Tale (Common Reader's Alice Thomas Ellis) (Paperback)
One of Ellis's most unusual novels, Fairy Tale is simultaneously bizarre and darkly humorous, intensely realistic and also fantastic, and magical but absurd, a combination certain to intrigue lovers of fine writing and keep them reading with fascination. Seventeen-year-old Eloise and her lover Simon have moved to a small country cottage in Wales where they are in touch with the flowers, birds, and the natural world, all beautifully described by Ellis. With tongue-in-cheek humor, Ellis describes the influence on Eloise of an older woman known as "Moonbird," with her ideas of a "woman's mission," which has resulted in Eloise's self-conscious awareness of the lovely, madonna-like scene she creates as she hand sews nightdresses and petticoats to sell in a shop in the nearby market town. Simon works as a carpenter.
From the opening paragraph with its references to "watchers," Ellis establishes a sense of mystery, and as the action evolves, and Eloise is visited by her ditzy mother Clare and her mother's more realistic friend Miriam, who come to investigate strange goings-on at the cottage, the reader gradually realizes that Eloise is being courted by magical spirits in the form of four men who pay a series of visits to her. Ellis's trademark humor is revealed especially through scenes in which the silly Clare and the realistic Miriam try to understand and rationalize what is going on, and the reader gradually suspects that the house is haunted and that the men-in-suits have a special destiny in mind for Eloise. In Part II, when Eloise suddenly appears with a baby, who lives in a rush-lined, ancient cradle and never cries, the magic and its power become even more haunting. Black magic and white magic combine with religious themes as Eloise, Clare, and the other residents of this strange cottage come to grips with the unknown and how to deal with it--if at all. What makes Ellis's novel so unusual, is that in this novel the reader is also confronted with the reverse question--how do the supernatural beings themselves deal with reality? Ellis's suggestion of the dependency of the fairy spirits on humans is unique, to say the least. Entertaining and filled with ironic humor, this novel is also thought-provoking and unique. n Mary Whipple
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