From Publishers Weekly
A midwife-cum-sorceress known simply as the Ugly One narrates this riveting tale of how, tricked by the devil's minions, she lost her gifts for healing and was forced to become a witch. Escaping from the stake, where she is about to be burned, she ekes out a solitary existence in an enchanted forest--until she takes in two wandering children named Hansel and Gretel. As she did in The Prince of the Pond , Napoli gives a classic fairy tale an entirely new twist, at the same time incorporating absorbing details about medieval religious beliefs. The witch's "true" history as a devoted mother and pious servant of God renders her a compelling and entirely sympathetic figure, a heroine courageously fighting the evil spirits that have invaded her once-pure life. The Hansel and Gretel motif, carefully woven into the story, emerges as a surprise for the reader, albeit a surprise that has been fully prepared. The author's extraordinary craftsmanship and originality never flag, and even the archetypically fiery ending for the witch acquires a new dimension. A YA novel of genuine magic and suspense, this will captivate adults as well. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
The author of The Prince in the Pond (1992) leaps from that comic take on ``The Frog Prince'' to a dark, deeply thoughtful novel whose gifted, driven, and wholly sympathetic protagonist is Hansel and Gretel's witch. The hunchback known as ``Ugly One'' is a midwife who becomes a healer when she learns to draw, with a blessed object, a magic circle that cannot be invaded by the devil's minions; from safely within it, she can command them to leave their victims. But the demons eventually trick her with a ring she hopes to give her beloved daughter, now of an age to marry. Now the sorceress who has commanded devils becomes a witch subject to their demands; still, with great care, she avoids the potent temptation to devour a child, which would complete her damnation. Hansel and Gretel's arrival, in the novel's last pages, is a cruel test; with extraordinary artistry, Napoli shapes a conclusion in which the witch finds redemption by collaborating with a clever Gretel, who senses the meaning of her fiery death. Writing in a beautifully honed first-person present and summoning splendid imagery well grounded in folklore, psychology, and the natural world, Napoli delves into the mind and heart of a fascinating figure embodying Faust and Marguerite in one--a nurturer and lover of true beauty whose inner being is never truly corrupted by the dangerous knowledge she dares to exert on others' behalf. Richly poetic yet accessible and immediate; pungent and wise; mesmerizing. Splendid jacket by the Dillons. (Fiction. 11+) --
Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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