This is a combined review for an interesting series of short stories. The Tales by Trees series are stand-alone fables that will appeal to an adult reader. Trees are incorporated as a central plot point in each story and serve as a theme to tie the series together. As an added bonus, according to the Amazon listing, each purchased copy will result in seven trees being planted.
Synopses from Amazon:
The Carpenter: Can we rebuild nature? The emperor’s chief master cabinetmaker is given an order to make whatever his own heart most desires. He knows immediately what he needs to build. But the challenge that he faces has serious consequences on his life and the people he loves.
The Knight: Is love able to defeat dragons? A young Knight spends his entire life preparing for a battle against a dragon. The task proves difficult since time passes at a highly accelerated pace in the dragon’s cave. In the end, help comes from a surprising source.
The Seafarer: What can dreams achieve? Every day, a prince goes to the seaside and dreams of sailing away. The sea means everything to him, as it remains his last connection to his mother. But since his city is surrounded by desert, he has no ships and there are no trees to build any. When the prince decides to trade his crown to three seeds that are said to be from the Great World Tree itself, surprising things start to happen.
My Thoughts: ARCs
I’ll admit I have a soft spot for fairytale and their retellings. These stories are well crafted and feel just like the traditional Grimm tales or Aesop fables.
Pros: While they may not appeal to every audience, these short stories feel impressively close to classic fairytales. Fans of this genre will feel a certain sense of nostalgia with the familiar cadence of the tales. The limited dialog requires character development through action over interaction with other characters, pulling the reader’s attention to the sense of the moral of the story rather than immersion in the story for sake of the narrative alone.
The characters and plots are strangely familiar and unique at the same time – the carpenter who loses himself in his magnum opus, the desert prince who devotes himself to realizing an improbable dream, and the knight who defies the odds achieve his life’s goal. Readers will likely anticipated the trajectory of the plots if not the actual endings, but the environmental emphasis and tone of the messages give a new spin to the predictable arc of the fable format.
Cons: The only big criticism I have about this series is that it appears to only be available as individual stories. If there were four or five of these stories compiled into an anthology, it would make for a really special collection.
Overall, I haven’t read anything quite like these little gems. They were pleasant deviations from regular novels.
Want to give them a try? Find the whole series on Amazon here.
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