From the Bookshelf of Fantasy Buddy Reads…

Second Hand Curses

Drew Hayes,

Scott Aiello (Narrator)

Start date: September 23, 2025

Finish date: October 7, 2025

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What Members Thought

Nov 21, 2017 Soo rated it it was amazing

Shelves: audiodrama, audiobook

5 Stars for Narration, 4 Stars for Story

Mini-Review:

Are you in the mood for a trio of anti-heroes? Then this is the perfect story for you. If you enjoyed Princess Bride, you'll love this audio-drama. Drew Hayes did a great job of taking well loved fairy tales and tossing the whole upside down into a new configuration of mischief, desires and warnings.

The narrators (Scott Aiello, Marc Vietor & Tavia Gilbert) did an excellent job! They really made the story work for me. Each of them were perfect ...more

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Feb 24, 2021 Tammie rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy-book-club-reads, fantasy, owned-audio, adult-fiction, stand-alones, retellings

When your fairy godmother threatens to enslave you with a curse - when a malevolent piper solves your rat problem but steals your children - when you seek revenge on the prince who turned you into a frog - who can you turn to in your hour of need? The band of scoundrels known far and wide as the Bastard Champions - the swashbuckling trio who travel a world of legend, seeking adventure and righting wrongs - as long as there's enough gold to be earned. They are Jack, the seemingly unkillable leade When your fairy godmother threatens to enslave you with a curse - when a malevolent piper solves your rat problem but steals your children - when you seek revenge on the prince who turned you into a frog - who can you turn to in your hour of need? The band of scoundrels known far and wide as the Bastard Champions - the swashbuckling trio who travel a world of legend, seeking adventure and righting wrongs - as long as there's enough gold to be earned. They are Jack, the seemingly unkillable leader whose ever-present grin belies a dark past; Marie, who fights with fury but battles more fiercely to control the beast within; and Frank, the master of logistics, whose cloak hides horrific scars that are far more than skin-deep. As they slash and scheme through kingdom and village alike, the Bastard Champions uncover tantalizing clues to their ultimate quarry: the powerful Blue Fairy, who has made each of their lives a living hell.

Second Hand Curses adds a dash of sly wit and a heaping portion of action to the fairy tales you thought you knew.

Drew Hayes has now become the most read author of our book club. This is the third book by him (the other two being The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant and NPCs) that we've read and probably the one I liked the best. I find his books very fun and easy to read, and wow, was this one fun to read! I loved the way the book was written as several shorter stories with one underlying plot thread to tie them all together. The different take on the fairy tales, with the fairies being evil was great for a change. It was also fun trying to figure out how the three main characters fit into the tales, and who they were. Frank was the most obvious, with Marie being the hardest one to figure out.

This was fun but also dark at times, which is exactly what the original fairy tales were. They were cautionary tales and I liked that this book kept with that theme. Jack, Frank, and Marie were also more anti heroes, which I'm not usually a big fan of, but it worked well in this book.With all the fairy tales that were retold in this book we had a lot of material to inspire us for our book club get together. My husband made a diorama featuring different scenes from the book for our centerpiece and we had some other cute food items. See the photos below.

I also wanted to mention that I listened to the audio of this book and it was fantastic.

Review also posted at Writings of a Reader ...more

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Mar 23, 2019 Brittany rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorite, fairy-tale-and-retellings, humour, fantasy, audiobook

I loved everything about listening to this book! The 3 narrators were amazing. The story made me laugh multiple times and I loved all the adventures. Each chapter is a different adventure but they all flow together so well. The characters have so much growth and I enjoyed seeing where they all came from.
Jack, Frank and Marie are not necessarily good people. They do lots of questionable things for gold. At the same time they do a lot of saving, also usually for gold. They are a group of mercenar ...more

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