The Fumbled Fairy Tales series stands on a fun overarching concept, as long as you only want something lighthearted, humorous, and short to read, because these two books are under 200 pages and have a very brisk pace and featherweight worldbuilding

In this world, fairies are guardians of fairy tales so that the stories are preserved as they are, without being mixed up or having their plot threads broken. In the library where they archive all the tales ever written, there is a magically-protected “master book” keeping the stories in order, looked over by fairy Elder Librarian Beatrice. Unfortunately, one day her boss asks her to babysit his half-human daughter, a terribly obnoxious and ill-mannered teen called Winfrey. The first thing Winfrey does is notice the master storybook, and in her arrogance, she decides that fairy tales are passé and outdated relics (sound familiar?) in need of a good shake. Without permission, she grabs the master book and shakes it violently, causing the pages to jumble together, everything to become chaotic, and the tales to blend together like in a blender.

Tales end up intertwined and tangled, with characters ejected from their tales and thrown into completely different ones. The first victim of Winfrey’s mischief is Bella, from Beauty and the Beast, who is ripped from her fairy tale as she tries to save her father and is thrown headfirst into the story of The Frog Prince, here a bullfrog called Riven. She has no choice but to share the tale with him, and, as expected, she falls in love with him and breaks his curse.

My initial reaction was that I didn’t find this way of creating a multiverse, so common in comics, funny. It’s not that I don’t understand that this is supposed to be humour and shouldn’t be taken too seriously, but I didn’t like it because of Winfrey.

The thing is, besides having a loathsome personality—I wonder if the author deliberately exaggerated the Gen Z horrid know-it-all teen stereotype for comedic effect—she embodies everything wrong with the literalist camp of fairy tale readers, those who take the plots of fairy tales literally and start talking about how girls need to be empowered, not wait for a prince, be active, how their moralising doesn’t apply to us modern enlightened people, etc. All that overlooks the metaphorical and symbolic side of tales. And yes, I know I’ve said this before, but as long as this short-sighted literalism remains popular, I’ll have to keep repeating it.

So, it read like they used the annoying girl to shoehorn in the trite message that princesses have to save themselves. There’s even a line from Winfrey that says as much. Of course, like the exaggerated stereotyping of edgy teens, this might be just parodying literalism for all I know.

But even without that, the plot of the first book in the series, Bella and the Bullfrog, is poorly developed and has several problems with pacing, narration, characterisation, and proper conclusion. The worst part, in my opinion, is that the author made Beast far more violent than in the Disney film (because this is based on Disney, and it shows), to the point that he’s physically violent with Bella: he lifts her off ground by the neck and almost chokes her in a fit of rage. Do you find this acceptable? Disney’s Beast has a bad temper, but he’s by no means physically abusive toward Belle, so this crossed a red line.

I’ll never understand why some authors think it’s a good idea to make Beast violent and abusive, and why on Earth they enjoy turning him into a toxic bully so much.

The kicker was that in Bella and the Bullfrog, the reason why Prince Riven is cursed to be a frog place reads like a bad joke: the fairy curses him because she thinks he ordered trash to be dumped into her pristine pond, causing her creatures to die from the pollution. So Riven has to live as a frog until he somehow cleans the pond of all that pollution. But later it’s revealed that the fairy knew perfectly well that the culprit wasn’t Riven but his wretched brother, yet she still made Riven pay unjustly and even has the nerve to justify herself saying that she “did it to test” the prince and make sure he wasn’t evil like his brother. Seriously? And how exactly was he supposed to clean the pond as a powerless frog?

That plot was plain awful. The “solution” to the curse is even worse because it reinforces how mean the fairy was, and how mediocre the plot is for relying so heavily on magic to solve plot twists.

But, luckily, the second book, Braids and the Beast, is much better.

In this one, Rapunzel is snatched from her own story and thrown into the world of Beauty and the Beast, where she takes Belle’s place and, unsurprisingly, ends up falling in love and breaking Beast’s curse.

The difference between this second book and the first is that, although its plot is also predictable, it’s better developed, and the story is actually quite funny, with comedic, tender, and serious moments interspersed throughout. It’s also a bit longer. Amanda Torrey is a much better writer, and she thinks her ideas through more carefully before executing them.

The Rapunzel in Braids and the Beast seems to be the one from Tangled (this series must be playing at creating a Disney Multiverse), mainly because of these characteristics: she wears the same pink dress from the film, walks barefoot, is seemingly dippy and starry-eyed, and her hair has magical powers. But Beast isn’t the Disney one, even though the plot is based on that and has similarities. Torrey handled Beast better than Callahan, in my opinion.

The relationship between Rapunzel and Beast is delightful; there are several quotes that I jotted down, and some funny scenes. Having lived two decades isolated in her tower with Gothel, she ignores much about the world and is not afraid of anything. Hence, she is also not afraid of Beast, unlike Bella, and his attempts to scare her only serve to make us laugh.

“I may be naïve‌,” she finally agreed, and her acquiescence didn’t please him the way it should have. “I’ve lived in one room for twenty years. I’ve only known two people. I’ve read about the world but never walked in it. So yes, I’m sure there are things I ought to fear that I don’t recognize.”

She paused, her gaze steady.

“But the issue here is I don’t believe most people are all good or all bad. You’re not excluded from this hypothesis.” She tilted her head in the other direction, as if viewing him from a new angle. “And no matter how you growl and grumble and bare your teeth, I’m not afraid of you.”

Rapunzel is adorable! Cheerful, unafraid, resourceful, bookish, kind, loves to paint, loves to write stories. Much better for Beast than Bella.

There were a number of things I loved about this book that it felt too short for everything it contained, so to avoid going on too long, I’ll summarise my favourite parts:

• This retelling has the technique of using first names to signal the moment a character’s feelings change. When Beast refuses to tell her his name out of sheer grumpiness, Rapunzel calls him Bartholomew (hahaha!) amongst other things because she doesn’t want to call him a beast. He nicknames her “braids” or “petite.” And when Beast finally softens, he tells her his name, and that’s when you realise he’s falling in love with her:

“Sébastien,” she whispered, testing the shape of his name. Perfection. Noble like the man who bore it. Strong and gentle, regal and relatable. A name with many facets, just like the man.

This is quite rare in fiction; I think I’ve seen it done well at most five times, and I’ve written about it here (Jane Austen, Georgette Heyer, GRRM with Sandor/Sansa, and my favourite Dorothies). So, 10/10 from me.

• Due to the conditions of the curse, Beast changes gradually rather than at once. Rapunzel can momentarily see his human face (which happens when he begins to change internally), and the way she reacts to it the first time made me laugh: she praises his jawline, which I think is a jab at romance novels that always emphasise the hero’s jawline. Since she likes to paint, she paints several portraits of Sébastien as Beast, as a human, and transforming in-between. It’s a beautiful detail, one I’ve never seen in other retellings, and it’s given me ideas for some illustrations I have in mind.

• Transformation happens to both of them here, not just Beast. Rapunzel, having known nothing but Gothel and Prince Alden, who used to sneak into her tower, lacks the understanding to realise that Mother Gothel is an abusive bitch that has mistreated her physically and emotionally her entire life. She can’t recognise abuse and becomes defensive if this is mentioned, as she believes she owes everything to Gothel and doesn’t want to see the abuse. Beast, who is aware that all of this is pure abuse, helps her gradually come to terms with it and finally confront her trauma with Gothel.

And yes, the final scene with Gothel is a bit contrived and could have been better written, but that’s not the point. Rapunzel also changes for the better thanks to Beast; they help each other, and that’s why their relationship feels natural despite the brisk pace.

• Although I didn’t like the use of Disney’s version of the curse, I did like that Sébastien earns his redemption through working, not just by finding true love. He has a debt with the villagers his saintly mother protected, so to redeem himself he has to work hard to help his people. I loved that there are three conditions to break the curse:

Gervais, breathing heavily, handed the leather to Sébastien. “‘It’s time for you to have your father’s blade. The enchantress left it with me with firm—and frightening—instructions to only give it to you once you’ve learned your three lessons.”

“I couldn’t recall all three. Remind me.”

“Yes, sir. Love—earn it and give it. Charity—engage in it freely and with compassion. Courage—accept yourself and others as they are.”

Very well done there, unique and original.

And was there anything in Braids and the Beast I didn’t enjoy? A couple of things. One is an actual issue for me, and the other is just something I wish had been different.

As I said before, I didn’t much like that they drew from the Disney version for Beast’s curse. In Disney, the curse is unfair and you could even say it’s child abuse because Prince Adam was a child when he was cursed. In this retelling, the justifications for the curse on Sébastien border on victim blaming, because he was in the process of grieving over losing his beloved mother, who died from a disease contracted from the poor villagers she helped.

Deep in the woods, Sébastien released a roar loud enough to rival the many sounds he’d made when the enchantress had first cursed him. Back then he’d been a young man full of pride, greed, anger. So much anger. Anger that he’d lost his mother. Anger that he couldn’t be the man he wanted to be. Anger that an enchantress had seized upon his flaws to turn him into this wretched creature doomed for a life devoid of human connection.

And then the story changed. Rapunzel entered his world, and for the first time since the tragic passing of his mother, hope bloomed.

Since he was still a child when this tragedy occurred, and it seems no one helped him manage/overcome his grief and depression, the appearance of an enchantress to curse him because, in his trauma and pain, he neglects the villagers, is to me an even more excessive punishment than Disney’s version. Furthermore, the plot tries to soften the injustice of his curse by having it happen when he’s already an adult (because it felt too wrong to curse a child, I suppose).

I think that, in part, this is compensated for by how well Sébastien’s redemption arc with his village is handled, and that much of this problem is also due to the book being very short and lacking context that could have been added and made the reasons for the curse more justifiable. As it is, the whiff of victim blaming is uncomfortable.

What I would have liked to be different is for this to be a longer book. It’s a character-driven story, so the worldbuilding is negligible, and many scenes are omitted or written in a summarised way. For example, when Rapunzel leaves the castle to see the world, readers don’t actually see her “see the world” because there’s hardly a couple of chapters and scenes with Gothel and Alden. Similarly, the confrontation scene with Gothel feels rushed. It’s just a shouting match and goodbye, thanks for seeing me. And Alden was also superfluous.

In conclusion, the length (or rather, the brevity) of the book did hurt the story. Not to the point of ruining it, no, but enough to make it feel like it was missing pages and that there was more story here that we never got. It needed to be longer.

NOTE: The rating is only for the second book.