Heidi Anne Heiner's Blog, page 27

Hans Christian Andersen at Frederiksborg Castle

On Monday, May 1, we took the train to Frederiksborg Castle in Hillerød, Denmark, about 45 minutes away from Copenhagen. Formerly a royal residence, it is now the Museum of National History for Denmark. We looked at a lot of art and saw some impressive rooms like the Chapel and the Great Hall. A small room in the Chapel is also where one can find the original religious paintings of Carl Bloch, one of my favorite parts of our visit. The chapel was quite impressive.

and the Great Hall (that's me in black in the far distance, just left of center, studying a sculpture). This one has great scope for imagining a royal ball, Cinderella visions included.

I wasn't expecting to see any Hans Christian Andersen references--silly me--but somewhat near the end of our visit, we entered a few rooms that had portraits of famous Danes. Well, I looked up over the doorway in one room to spy a familiar face. Hmmm, over a doorway and hard to see, I thought. This picture was taken with my zoom.

Then I entered the next room and realized HCA, unlike most of the other famous figures, was represented twice. The sunlight made it hard to get a good photo, unfortunately, without glare.

That was more than I expected, but there was more to come. Quite literally the last room we visited before returning to the hallway that lead to the gift shop--finding the gift shop's always a good sign that your tour is done--I discovered this little dark alcove. Well, I know him, I thought! 


This time the room was too dark--and no flash allowed, of course--to get very good images. I could barely read some of the items in the dim light when standing in front of it. Some of my photos are too blurry to share, but I did get a few in focus. 

I don't remember ever seeing this portrait before. Obviously, he was going through one of the "I'll experiment with facial hair" stages of early manhood. He was 26 when the portrait was painted.



This was one of the photos I am most familiar with of HCA.

An HCA papercut! Always fun to see one of those!

Two Bargain Ebooks: The Wrath & the Dawn and The Rose & the Dagger by Renée Ahdieh TODAY ONLY

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Both The Wrath & the Dawn by Renée Ahdieh and its sequel, The Rose & the Dagger, are on sale TODAY ONLY for $2.99 each in ebook format. This is the first time the sequel has been on sale to my knowledge. I haven't read these yet, but my sister recommends them. And if you like Arabian Nights and Scheherazade inspired stories, these are a must. These are usually more in the $10 range.

Book description for The Wrath & the Dawn:

#1 New York Times Bestseller

A sumptuous and epically told love story inspired by A Thousand and One Nights

Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi’s wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.

She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all.

Book description for The Rose & the Dagger:

The much anticipated sequel to the breathtaking The Wrath and the Dawn, lauded by Publishers Weekly as "a potent page-turner of intrigue and romance."

I am surrounded on all sides by a desert. A guest, in a prison of sand and sun. My family is here. And I do not know whom I can trust.

In a land on the brink of war, Shahrzad has been torn from the love of her husband Khalid, the Caliph of Khorasan. She once believed him a monster, but his secrets revealed a man tormented by guilt and a powerful curse—one that might keep them apart forever. Reunited with her family, who have taken refuge with enemies of Khalid, and Tariq, her childhood sweetheart, she should be happy. But Tariq now commands forces set on destroying Khalid's empire. Shahrzad is almost a prisoner caught between loyalties to people she loves. But she refuses to be a pawn and devises a plan.

While her father, Jahandar, continues to play with magical forces he doesn't yet understand, Shahrzad tries to uncover powers that may lie dormant within her. With the help of a tattered old carpet and a tempestuous but sage young man, Shahrzad will attempt to break the curse and reunite with her one true love.

To Travel Is to Live: Copenhagen and Hans Christian Andersen

Hello all! I have safely returned from a trip to the Baltic where I encountered many fairy tale sightings, some expected and some not. I am going to share pictures and stories over the next several days, going in chronological order for our trip. My husband John and my parents traveled with me on this grand adventure!
We arrived in Copenhagen, Denmark on April 29th. After two flights and too many hours sitting with very little sleep, we wearily navigated the airport to claim our luggage. We turned one corner and suddenly I was face to face with the Little Mermaid! I scrambled for my camera for obvious reasons and snapped these pictures. 
There was a replica of the Little Mermaid statue that sits in the harbor. We weren't planning to go to the harbor during our stay in Copenhagen so I was thrilled to see the mermaid in the airport. (And I would see other versions throughout our explorations of Copenhagen, too, most of which I didn't photograph.) Don't worry, I did plan on a few other fairy tale visits, just not to the harbor which was out of the way of our other destinations and cold. We spend the entire trip in coats, gloves and hats. It was a chilly, even snowy, spring in the Baltic!

There was also a large display case featuring the traveling trunk Hans Christian Andersen used in his own travels. It was large--nearly five feet tall--and suddenly made me feel better about my single suitcase and backpack for a two week trip. But I also felt sorry for whoever had to lug that thing around when it was full--no wheels and not very convenient handles either.

Here is the placard about HCA that accompanied the statue and trunk. You can click on it to make it larger and hopefully read it if you are interested.

More HCA sightings to come as we explored Copenhagen!

Bargain Ebook: A Whole New World: A Twisted Tale by by Liz Braswell for $1.99

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A Whole New World: A Twisted Tale by by Liz Braswell is on sale today only for $1.99 down from a usual range of $10. This is a novel retelling Aladdin--the Disney version--from with dark twists, part of a series by Braswell for the Disney imprint that retells many Disney fairy tales. Oh, the layers of folklore manipulation!

Book description:

What if Aladdin had never found the lamp? This first book in the A Twisted Tale line will explore a dark and daring version of Disney's Aladdin. When Jafar steals the Genie's lamp, he uses his first two wishes to become sultan and the most powerful sorcerer in the world. Agrabah lives in fear, waiting for his third and final wish.To stop the power-mad ruler, Aladdin and the deposed princess Jasmine must unite the people of Agrabah in rebellion. But soon their fight for freedom threatens to tear the kingdom apart in a costly civil war. What happens next? A Street Rat becomes a leader. A princess becomes a revolutionary. And readers will never look at the story of Aladdin in the same way again.

Bargain Ebook: The Wish Granter (Ravenspire Book 2) by C. J. Redwine

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The Wish Granter (Ravenspire Book 2) by C. J. Redwine is bargain priced for $1.99 for the first time in ebook format. That is down from the usual price of $9.99 so grab it while you can. This is the second book in a planned lengthy series featuring fairy tale retellings, following The Shadow Queen which retold Snow White. This one takes a less commonly retold tale, Rumpelstiltskin which thrills me no end.

Book description:

An epic, romantic, and action-packed fantasy inspired by the tale of Rumpelstiltskin, about a bastard princess who must take on an evil fae to save her brother’s soul, from C. J. Redwine, the New York Times bestselling author of The Shadow Queen. Perfect for fans of Graceling and the Lunar Chronicles.

The world has turned upside down for Thad and Ari Glavan, the bastard twins of Súndraille’s king. Their mother was murdered. The royal family died mysteriously. And now Thad sits on the throne of a kingdom whose streets are suddenly overrun with violence he can’t stop.

Growing up ignored by the nobility, Ari never wanted to be a proper princess. And when Thad suddenly starts training Ari to take his place, she realizes that her brother’s ascension to the throne wasn’t fate. It was the work of a Wish Granter named Alistair Teague who tricked Thad into wishing away both the safety of his people and his soul in exchange for the crown.

So Ari recruits the help of Thad’s enigmatic new weapons master, Sebastian Vaughn, to teach her how to fight Teague. With secret ties to Teague’s criminal empire, Sebastian might just hold the key to discovering Alistair’s weaknesses, saving Ari’s brother—and herself.

But Teague is ruthless and more than ready to destroy anyone who dares stand in his way—and now he has his sights set on the princess. And if Ari can’t outwit him, she’ll lose Sebastian, her brother…and her soul.

Bargain Ebook: A Knot in the Grain: and Other Stories by Robin McKinley

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A Knot in the Grain: and Other Stories by Robin McKinley is on sale in ebook format for $1.99. It is usually in the $6-7 range.

Book description:

Magical stories set in alternate universes . . . tales of curses and gifts of healing . . . a wizard who has lost his powers . . . and a princess, a troll, and a teenage girl are featured in this diverse collection from Newbery Medalist Robin McKinley

In “The Healer,” Lily was born mute, but she has so great a natural gift for healing that the local midwife and healer takes her as an apprentice. One evening, riding home, she meets a stranger on the road who can speak to her silently, mind to mind. Overjoyed, she takes him home to Jolin—but Jolin can read the mage-mark on him and fears for Lily’s safety, for mages are not to be trusted.

In “The Stagman,” Ruen is a princess and will become queen on her name day—if her uncle, the Regent, greedy for the power that should belong to his niece, cannot think of a way to prevent it. And so he invents portents and a purifying ritual that involves chaining Ruen to a rock in an old place of sacrifice, not used since her great-grandfather’s day, and leaving her there alone. Night falls on her despair and in the flickering torchlight she sees the shadow of a man—or of a man with a stag’s antlers—or perhaps of a great stag.

In “Touk’s House,” a witch adopts a woodcutter’s baby daughter and raises her along with her own son, whose father was a troll. Erana grows up knowing she is loved, and loving in return—but on her seventeenth birthday she realizes she must leave her foster mother and her best friend and find where in the world she belongs.

In “Buttercups,” an old man marries a young wife and takes her home, but he feels unworthy of her vivid youth and risks all for a tremendous prize, in an act of what in his heart he knows is a betrayal of the wild magic that lives on his farm.

In “A Knot in the Grain,” Annabelle has no choice when her parents decide they will move to a small town upstate, the summer before Annabelle’s junior year of high school. She spends the summer reclaiming the neglected garden of their new house and reading books from the local library. She also finds a mysterious wooden box in a tiny hidden study above her attic bedroom: a box containing smallish, roundish, nobbly things Annabelle can’t identify, but which are faintly warm to the touch—and which seem to be curiously aware of Annabelle, her loneliness, and her longings.

Bargain Ebook: Godmother: The Secret Cinderella Story by Carolyn Turgeon for $1.99

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Godmother: The Secret Cinderella Story by Carolyn Turgeon is on sale in ebook format for $1.99. This one is a Cinderella retelling, one of many fairy tale novels by Turgeon.

Book description:

A new take on Cinderella, told from the perspective of the fairy godmother living in modern-day Manhattan

Lil is an old woman who spends her days shelving rare books in a tiny Manhattan bookstore and lonely nights at home in her apartment. But Lil has an intriguing secret. Tucked and bound behind her back are white feathery wings--the only key to who she once was: the fairy godmother responsible for getting Cinderella to the ball to unite with her Prince Charming.

But on that fateful night, something went terribly and beautifully wrong. Lil allowed herself the unthinkable: to feel the emotions of human beings and fall in love with the prince herself, going to the ball in place of Cinderella in her exquisitely gorgeous human guise. For her unforgivable mistake, she was banished to live among humans, far from her fairy sisters and their magical underwater world. But then one day she meets Veronica--a young, fair-skinned, flame-haired East Village beauty with a love of all things vintage and a penchant for falling in love with the wrong men--and suddenly it becomes clear to Lil that she’s been given a chance at redemption. If she can find a soul mate for Veronica, she may be able to right her wrong and return to the fairy world she so deeply longs for.

Bargain Ebook: Fairest of All: A Tale of the Wicked Queen by Serena Valentino for $1.99

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Fairest of All: A Tale of the Wicked Queen by Serena Valentino is on sale in ebook format for a limited time for $1.99. Price could go up any time so don't hesitate if you're interested. (The sale was supposed to only yesterday!)

Book description:

Why exactly is the wicked Queen so nasty, particularly to Snow White? Perhaps it has something to do with the creepy-looking man in the magic mirror who's not just some random spooky visage...

New Book: Spindle Fire by Lexa Hillyer

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Spindle Fire by Lexa Hillyer is officially released tomorrow. This one is a Sleeping Beauty inspired novel. It features two sisters, an unusual construct in Sleeping Beauty tales, but a fascinating way to deal with the sleep curse.

Book description:

Half sisters Isabelle and Aurora are polar opposites: Isabelle is the king's headstrong illegitimate daughter, whose sight was tithed by faeries; Aurora, beautiful and sheltered, was tithed her sense of touch and her voice on the same day. Despite their differences, the sisters have always been extremely close.

And then everything changes with a single drop of Aurora's blood--and a sleep so deep it cannot be broken. As the faerie queen and her army of Vultures prepare to march, Isabelle must race to find a prince who can awaken her sister with the kiss of true love and seal their two kingdoms in an alliance against the queen.

Isabelle crosses land and sea; unearthly, thorny vines rise up the palace walls: and whispers of revolt travel in the ashes on the wind. The kingdom falls to ruin under layers of snow. Meanwhile, Aurora wakes up in a strange and enchanted world, where a mysterious hunter may be the secret to her escape . . . or the reason for her to stay.

Spindle Fire is a lush fantasy set in the dwindling, deliciously corrupt world of the fae and featuring two truly unforgettable heroines.

New Book: The Great Pursuit by Wendy Higgins

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The Great Pursuit by Wendy Higgins, a sequel to The Great Hunt and final proclaimed book of a duology, was released earlier this month. The first novel, and thus this one, is inspired by a lesser known Grimms tale, The Singing Bone. That's always fun when we get a lesser know tale. I have a wishlist of tales that I would love to see inspire modern novels. The reviews are not many yet, but the ones that are there are all enthusiastic.

Book description:

In The Great Pursuit, the dramatic sequel to the New York Times bestselling The Great Hunt, Wendy Higgins delivers another thrilling fantasy filled with dangerous enemies, political intrigue, searing romance, and a princess who is willing to do everything to protect her kingdom.

One hunt has ended, but the pursuit for love and justice continues.

The kingdom of Lochlanach has traded the great beast that once terrorized the realm of Eurona for something far more dangerous: the ire of powerful Lashed woman Rosaria Rocato. Rosaria demands that Eurona overturn the laws prohibiting magic, or an innocent will be killed each day.

Despite the king’s resistance, Princess Aerity believes they must make peace with the Lashed, and though she’s accepted a betrothal to the man who took down the beast, she cannot help thinking about Paxton, the Lashed man who stole her heart and disappeared.

Aerity soon discovers that Paxton has joined Rosaria’s army in the war against her family. Though her feelings for him are still strong, her duty to her kingdom and her family is stronger—especially when her parents are kidnapped and she has to step up to the throne and once again put aside what’s best for her in order to do what’s best for her people. Paxton and Princess Aerity must fight to see what is more powerful: their love or the impending war between the magical Lashed and the non-magic humans.