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Spinners Donna Jo Napoli Richard Tchen Books

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Spinners Donna Jo Napoli Richard Tchen Books

I'm glad that 3 stars on Amazon equals "It's OK" because that's just how I felt about Spinners, the first book I've read by Donna Jo Napoli.

In Spinners, Napoli has taken the tale of Rumpelstiltskin and fleshed it out, creating Rumpelstiltskin's side of the story, so-to-speak. The story is told in present tense (which I usually dislike as I feel it reads somewhat awkwardly), and covers a number of years in the life of a young man who loses in love and the lives of those with whom his story is entwined.

Spinners is a fast read and, while it held my interest, in the end I was left dissatisfied and slightly depressed. Other reviewers complained about the abrupt ending and recommended Napoli's other retold fairy tales, including Zel. While the story in Spinners didn't make me want to seek out her other books, Napoli's writing is above average, so I may take those reviewers' advice and give her another try.


Tags : Amazon.com: Spinners (9780141311104): Donna Jo Napoli, Richard Tchen: Books,Donna Jo Napoli, Richard Tchen,Spinners,Puffin,014131110X,902246925,Fairy Tales & Folklore - General,Fantasy & Magic,Girls & Women,Juvenile literature,Children's 12-Up - Fiction - General,Children: Young Adult (Gr. 7-9),Fairy tales,Fairy tales, folk tales, fables, magical tales & traditional stories,Fairy tales.,Fantasy & magical realism (Children'sYA),Fantasy - General,Fathers and daughters,Fathers and daughters;Fiction.,Fiction,Fiction dealing with specific issues,General,Juvenile Fiction Fairy Tales & Folklore General,Juvenile Fiction Girls & Women,Science fiction (Children'sYA),Spinning,Spinning;Fiction.,Women & girls,YOUNG ADULT FICTION,Young Adult Fiction Fairy Tales & Folklore General,Young Adult Fiction Fantasy General,Young Adult Fiction Girls & Women,Juvenile Fiction,Educational: Citizenship & social education,Fantasy & magical realism (Children's Teenage),Science fiction (Children's Teenage),Traditional stories (Children'sYA)

Spinners Donna Jo Napoli Richard Tchen Books Reviews

Be warned Donna Jo Napoli (and here, her coauthor Richard Tchen) does not do happy Disney retellings. There will be some mature topics. There will be a little blood. There will be heartbreak. In "Spinners", however, there will also be characters you can connect with and twists that shed light on the original Rumpelstiltskin story just as they differentiate from it.

Rumpelstiltskin wasn't always an ugly old cripple. He used to be a fairly handsome tailor in love with a pretty girl. Her father didn't agree, though, unless the tailor could make the girl a cloth-of-gold dress. The poor tailor made off with an old woman's spinning wheel and spent night and day spinning straw into gold for that dress, but the apparently-magic wheel took its revenge and made him ugly and crippled. The shallow girl married somebody else, but she was pregnant with the tailor's child.

That child is Saskia, who learns to spin from an early age so she can support herself during her father's (by that I mean her mother's husband's) drinking bouts. Her abilities get the attention of the king, who demands that she spin straw into gold for him. Saskia's sure she'll lose her life until a mysterious cripple offers her some help. But he demands a steep price . . .

Napoli almost always humanizes her villains, and her Rumpelstiltskin is both obsessive and pathetic, longing only for someone who will look past his ugliness. The lengths he goes to for this are pretty ridiculous, but hey, my heart's not made of stone. I thought he was the best character in the book. Saskia, with her exaggerated innocence (Napoli's "Zel" featured a less extreme case of this), is a little annoying at first, but once she learns to support herself, she grows into a strong young woman determined to keep her life and, later, her child.

There were a few problems in the plot. For example, Saskia's drunken foster father decides to quit on life because she shaved him in the night (um, what?). The ending is abrupt and doesn't really resolve much. But "Spinners" is powerful and gripping and will satisfy someone who doesn't go in for conventional retellings.
Donna Jo Napoli has the ability to plumb the depths of familiar tales, unearthing valuable nuggets of gold. Her ability to breathe life into the fairy tale's characters is superb. Spinners is a tragic tale of rejection and longing, a tale of a crippled tailor whose unrequited love for a miller's daughter sets him on a quest for acceptance.

A tailor and miller's daughter have loved each other for years. When the tailor must prove his worth to the miller by creating a gold wedding dress, his desperation prompts him to spin upon a cursed wheel. Thus the tailor becomes crippled for life. The miller rejects the tailor's suit upon seeing his disfigurement. When the miller's daughter likewise rejects her suitor, the tailor flees in humiliation and disgrace. Yet something draws him back, and a young child who possesses the ability to create beautiful yarn will become the catalyst that sets into motion extraordinary events. This is a story of a father's love, and a quest for someone to guess the truth within a person's soul.

I enjoyed the simple language of the tale. It was fast-paced but deep. I loved the independence of Saskia, the heroine of the tale. I also loved how familiar elements of the Grimms Brothers story remained intact. The author stayed true to the original source while providing reasons for the "little man's" eccentricities. I felt the ending was a bit rushed. However, I found the ending to be satisfying. This tale is realistic and unflinching, so those expecting a "happy" ending might be disappointed.

Suzanne Toran narrates with great agility. The pain of the tailor is palpable, and the other characters are clearly drawn. The pacing is not rushed, and the voices are not melodramatic or grating.

Please give this riveting tale a chance. God bless you all.
Never finished. Thought I would like this book as I'm a fiber artist. Just didn't. Maybe too slow for me.
This is another book I read as a kid and still love now. In fact, I love pretty much everything this author writes.

As you can probably guess from the title, this is Rumpelstilzken, Donna Joe Napoli style. A young man makes a foolish boast so he can wed his sweetheart (with whom he has already been intimate) and steals a spinning wheel from an old woman so he can attempt to spin straw into gold. It works, but maims him, and the woman must marry another because she's pregnant with his child. She dies in childbirth, hating the evil little man she thinks he's become, he wanders off alone, and their daughter is left to be raised by her stepfather (who thinks he's her father.)

Anyway, you know how the story goes and how it ends. This is a tale of pride, of love misplaced or trust gone wrong and deep loneliness. My only complaint with the whole book is that the ending is way too abrupt-and that knocks it down to a still respectably four star rating.
I'm glad that 3 stars on equals "It's OK" because that's just how I felt about Spinners, the first book I've read by Donna Jo Napoli.

In Spinners, Napoli has taken the tale of Rumpelstiltskin and fleshed it out, creating Rumpelstiltskin's side of the story, so-to-speak. The story is told in present tense (which I usually dislike as I feel it reads somewhat awkwardly), and covers a number of years in the life of a young man who loses in love and the lives of those with whom his story is entwined.

Spinners is a fast read and, while it held my interest, in the end I was left dissatisfied and slightly depressed. Other reviewers complained about the abrupt ending and recommended Napoli's other retold fairy tales, including Zel. While the story in Spinners didn't make me want to seek out her other books, Napoli's writing is above average, so I may take those reviewers' advice and give her another try.