Today’s Grimm Guest…Nadia Lee
Fairy Tale Curses
In many fairy tales, princes and/or princesses are usually cursed and/or punished in some ways over an unkind or rude deed. For example, in Disney’s edition of Beauty and the Beast, the Beast paid the price because he refused to allow an old woman a night’s shelter. In Sleeping Beauty, the wicked fairy cursed the baby princess over a snub. In Rapunzel, a witch takes a baby girl because the girl’s parents stole the witch’s vegetables.
I decided to create a reason for the Beast’s curse in my retelling A Happily Ever After of Her Own. But since it’s a light story, I didn’t want the cause to be a theft or something dark that might portray the Beast as an unworthy hero. Since the plot also deals with some deeply dysfunctional fairy tale families, I had to come up with something that touched upon that as well.
So what was the cause for the Beast’s punishment?
“Leave her out of this. Your quarrel is with me. You’re still upset I called you Auntie Beet.”
“Oh, is that what you think?” The Evil Witch’s shrill laugh scraped over his nerves like sandpaper. “I’m not upset, my darling. I’m livid. Beets are the most grotesque, objectionable vegetables in the world. They’re more reviled than mushy, overcooked brussel sprouts. You weren’t just mocking a bad dye job. You were calling me smelly and disgusting!”
“By all the gods, I was nine! This is no longer funny.”
“For once you’re perfectly correct. It is most definitely not funny. So we’re going to make it serious.”
There you have it. The Witch was upset because her vanity was wounded. 🙂
If you had a magical power to curse anybody for any kind of offense, what kind of curse would you put them under and for what offense? Answer for your chance to win an ebook copy of A Happily Ever After of Her Own. (Open international; available in prc, epub or pdf.)
About Nadia Lee:
Bilingual former management consultant Nadia Lee has lived in four different countries and enjoyed many adventures and excellent food around the globe. In the last eight years, she has kissed stingrays, got bitten by a shark, ridden an elephant and petted tigers.
She shares an apartment overlooking a river and palm trees in Japan with her husband, winter white hamsters and an ever-widening pile of books. When she’s not writing, she can be found digging through old Asian historical texts or planning another trip.
Nadia is giving away one download of her story…open internationally.
To enter, just leave a comment below.
Remember, all comments left during the daily Grimm Giveaway are entered for the big giveaway…info here. Make sure you’ve read my disclaimer-all winners will be posted to my blog and that’s your notification. If you don’t check back…you don’t know if you’ve won. More info on the Grimm giveaway link.
Dying is hard enough… coming back to life is brutal.
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I love it! Beets – yuck! I hate them and won’t even allow them in my house so I understand her ire ;).
How exciting to have lived all those different places, it must make good ideas for your writing.
Gigi s
Gigis0426(at)gmail(dot)com
I love it. If I had a magical power to curse anybody for any kind of offense, it would be: To put them to sleep for 1000 years. That way when they wake up the world as they knew it would be drastically changed and they would not be able to be the same person they were before they went to sleep. The offense they would be cursed for would be abusing a child. that is THE ONE offense that really makes me loose my cool.
Thank you for the chance to win. I would love to win this book.
reneebennett35 at yahoo dot com
i think if i had a power it would be to turn the in to a toad or something like that and that they would have to stay that way until they not only found true love but obtained the forgiveness of the person they had injured.
trvlagnt1t@yahoo.com
I love the fairy tale stories. This one sounds cool. Thank.
mythic021@gmail.com
Sound funny ! Not really into being able to curse people, could not afford for it to come back at me !! 😉
Sounds like a wonderful story. I am very careful not to curse anyone. Whatever you cast will come back on you seven fold.
So I only send out love and good cheer. ;-}}
Sounds interesting to me def added to my already huge TBR pile thank God for ebooks
oh btw no curses for me but a tim out chair in the corner sounds good to me
Gee, there are so many things I could happily curse someone for it is hard to just choose one . However, I think a lack of compassion deserves a good curse, and it would be that the person has to walk a mile in his victim’s shoes to teach a little humility, understanding and common decency.
Curse out the way, the book sounds great! 🙂
I don’t want to take revenge that badly on anyone so no cursing. I wouldn’t mind having a good power such as curing diseases though.
Not sure I feel qualified to curse anyone, but if I had the power to right a wrong, I would certainly be willing to drop someone who hurt someone else by being selfish & thoughtless, into a situation where the shoe would be on the other foot & maybe, just maybe they would come out of it a little more thoughtful & selfless.
Wouldn’t want to do any serious injury-my idea of a curse would be for someone to experience the insensitivty that they showed someone else, and learn from it. I love retold fairy tales, and this sounds good.
Sometimes I am around people whose every other word or complete sentences are filled with expletives. When they read the point that it is offending me and I mention it to them and they keep going then I would like to curse them so they can never use another expletive regardless of the language it is spoken in and therefore have to expand their vocabulary.
I love your reason for the curse too.
If I had a magical power to curse anybody for any kind of offense, what kind of curse would I put them under and for what offense? I’m not fond of the curse idea-bad karma; however, I think I’d want some kind of “mirror curse” so when the offense (really any offense that ticked me off) they committed made me feel bad-they’d have those feelings reflected upon them so they would be forced to empathize with my plight. The idiot that cuts me off in traffic and causes a mini coronary-right back at ya bub…feel free to enjoy that dose of anxiety as my heart leaps in my throat when I apply the brakes to avoid an accident.
Great concept! I do enjoy the modernized fairy tale.
mljfoland AT hotmail DOT com
First off, I don’t condone cursing people. After all, do unto others and all. But, I would curse people to feel how others around them feel when they are mistreated by the cursed person. You see, I figure the feedback should be very effective in training them to act a different way!
Thank you everyone for stopping by and for interesting comments and answers! 😀
I don’t condone cursing people either, but in fairy tale, it seems more or less necessary. So many stories have curses and/or some kind of punishment that the main characters must suffer through in order to achieve their HEA. 🙂
I like many of your ideas about making people feel the same pain that they’ve inflicted on others due to cruelty and/or lack of caring. I love the idea of people learning to treat each other with more kindness and courtesy. 🙂
Sounds great! Beauty and the Beast is my favorite! I love this story. 🙂
shadowluvs2read(at)aol(dot)com