Following 2004’s Labyrinth and 2005’s Yume No HON: The Book of Dreams, Catherynne Valente returns to a mythical universe with the first opener of the new series: The Orphan’s Tales.
Valente weaves a story about a young Prince who battles stigma and superstition to reach out to a young girl who lives in the palace garden. Believed to be of demonic origin, the girl is shunned by everyone, including the Sultan and the royal family, largely because of the mysterious tattoos around her eyes (which are in fact the living lines of stories endowed upon her shortly after birth). The young Prince decides to speak with her and they soon form a relationship of mutual curiosity, bound together by the stories she is willing to tell and he is eager to drink up.
In this style the homage to Arabian Nights is unmistakable, the orphan girl embodying the clever wife Shahrazade and the young Prince the King Shahryar. From their cozy haven in the palace garden the Prince, and the reader along with him, are swallowed into a magical world of shape-shifting beasts, ambitious kings, and fool-hardy royalty. The girl tells only one tale about a prince who kills a mystic woman’s favorite goose, but from there the tale tells itself, meandering from one character’s story to the next.
Here the book shows its true colors: a lyrically written collection of fairy tales that are as original as they are bizarre. With metaphors and similes like, “the girl spoke, and her voice filled up the boy like cream splashing in a silver bowl,” Valente’s love for poetic prose is clearly evident.
Although a great compilation of fairy tales with a wide breadth of tone, Valente’s wording is a little hard to get used to. With two or sometimes three similes per sentence don’t be surprised if you’re stumbling through pages in the first chapter or two before you find a beat with the diction. Her structuring of the entire novel itself is also a little jarring and dizzying to say the least. With so many characters telling their own story (within a story within a story) it’s very easy to get confused when trying to frame and put into perspective their relationships with one another. Where there is chaos, however, the central tale between the young Prince and the orphan girl provides the glue. If you’re a fan of Valente’s work or just plain enjoy some rhythmically written fairy tales pick up The Orphan’s Tales: In The Night Garden.
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