The Last Romantics

by Tara Conklin

Now Noni explained her own early life and marriage as a cautionary tale, the period of her paralyzing grief the price we all paid for her foolishness. In these stories our father emerged as a dashing but hapless prince, one who lulled the good princess into a life of fat complacency deep within a castle of tricks and mirrors. When the prince disappeared, the castle was revealed to be only a cardboard shell; there was no coach, no footmen, only the pumpkin and the simpering mice. The shock of it all sent the princess into a deep sleep, until a good fairy godmother—not another prince, please, anything but that—roused her. And what did the princess see when she first awoke? What greeted her and stirred her fully from the glass chamber? Why, it was the mice, of course. They clambered atop the wreckage of the castle and reminded her that she could build it herself again.

Beautiful