#cinderellis and the glass hill

[fairytale-poll]

ROUND 2B, MATCH 1 OUT OF 8!

Propaganda Under the Cut:

Ella of Frell:

She's had a "gift" of obedience placed on her, and her quest is to figure out how to get rid of it. I love her

he's under a curse that makes her obey any order given to her. She met her Prince Charming (Char) when they kids, and they became friends. Her stepsisters found out about her curse while they were at boarding school, and because of that (and some things they made her do) she ran away to try and find the fairy that cursed her. When she does, the fairy says that she doesn't do magic anymore, because she realized her gifts were actually curses, and refuses to remove it. Ella goes back, and is eventually demoted from "lord's daughter" to "maid". She still writes letters to Char (currently in a foreign kingdom, but before that, when he came to try and talk to her, her sister forbid her from leaving her room so she would have all his attention), but eventually stops and even writes a fake letter from her sister to convince him that she never cared/doesn't care about him, because she realized it would be too dangerous for them to be together; with her curse, she could easily be made to hurt or kill him. Flash forward, and Char returns home. The king throws balls, and she goes, because even if she can't be with or let him know who she is, she just wants to see him again. Char is drawn to her, and for a lot of the three balls, they're together. At the end, her stepsister gets jealous, and right as Char proposes (because Ella, despite having to lie about her identity, is the most honest person at the ball and a friend already), she grabs her mask, revealing her identity. Char reaches her home before she can leave, and there's a whole scene where he finds out she's a scullery maid, that the letter was a lie, and says that she doesn't have to be Ella if she doesn't want to be, and she says she's not, and he asks if she loves him, and she does-- and then it's all ruined because he accidentally orders her to marry him, and then her stepmother tells her to, and all the while she's fighting the curse, because she doesn't want to endanger him and their nation, and doesn't want her step family to be rich and powerful, and finally-- she says no. She gets so excited to say no, to refuse, that she didn't even fully realize she broke the curse until Mandy (her fairy godmother) tells her. Anyway, they all lived happily ever after. Ella is one of my favorite Cinderellas ever and I really hope I did a good job of explaining her and what her story is about (it's been a while since I've read the book)

I was so enraptured with this book as a kid, it had such an impact on my young mind. Got me into fantasy.

BEST CINDERELLA!!! please use the picture from the book cover and not the movie 🙏

She breaks her curse spell in such a magnificent way. Like yes she embodies the whole “kindness” and “courageous” characteristics that Cinderellas are known for, but for her she’s been forced to be obedient as well. And while she thinks can rise above anything she soon learns she will just hurt so many more people that way. She chose to be self-sacrificing because it was the one way she could express her love that wouldn’t harm anyone (then). But! But! She also ends up getting to be selfish! And that is also a great kindness! To herself and to those whom love her and she loves in return.  All that after she breaks the curse.

She can mimic languages. :) She refused to marry the love of her life and thus broke her curse. :) She fell in love via letters. :) She lied to the royal family that orange carriages are very popular in a nearby city.

brave, smart, a linguist, a nerd, she evolves steadily and beautifully throughout the book, with a sharp voice that never stops being distinctive and fun to hang with.

complex character coool as fuck premise and also. the nostalgia of it all

Cinderellis:

I submit him more as early cannon fodder than anything else, though he is a very fun and interesting character to follow in the 150ish page book we find him in, where he fulfills both the Cinderella main points of mythic importance, as well as a Ukrainian fairy tale involving the rule of three and how it applies to precious metals, and the materials one may use on a quest. Also, both he, and the girl he eventually marries are just fun characters to see the viewpoints of.

[haveyoureadthisfantasybook]

vote yes if you have finished the entire book.

vote no if you have not finished the entire book.

(faq · submit a book)

[hazel-janes-books-galore]

2000 editions of The Fairy’s Mistake and The Princess Test by Gail Carson Levine.

2001 editions of Cinderellis and the Glass Hill and Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep by Gail Carson Levine. 

[haveyoureadthismgyabook]

Series info:

Book 1 of The Princess Tales

Book 2: The Princess Test

Book 3: Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep

Book 4: Cinderellis and the Glass Hill

Book 5: For Biddle's Sake

Book 6: The Fairy's Return

[hermesserpent-stuff]

ye. i like this question.

-

It is one of Peter's favorites. He has trouble choosing just one.

Ock: Thomas Hobbes the Leviathan. Dont ask. Electro: Black Beauty Vulture: Island of Doctor Moreau Rhino: doesn't really read Sandy: doesn't really read Tinkerer: Cinderellis and the Glass Hill Dan: Dave at Night Tombstone:The art of war Ox: Snow white and rose red Montana: The Black Stallion Quentin: The art of war/Cinderellis and the Glass Hill/Fairest

I only put books i read so that is a limiting factor.

[dotrousersmatter]

any good reads u'd recommend?

Cinderellis and the Glass Hill.

[whilereadingandwalking]

Signed Saturday

When I was young, I loved Gail Carson Levine, from the classic Ella Enchanted to one of my top ten childhood favorite books, Two Princesses of Bamarre, to the series of The Princess Tales, a really fantastic series of fairy tale retellings and mash-ups. So it was an absolute joy when my best friend gave me a surprise gift: a signed copy of Cinderellis and the Glass Hill. It’s signed “Climb every hill!” In this one, Levine tells the story of a young, downtrodden boy named Cinderellis, trying to earn the heart of princess Marigold.

Signed Saturdays is a weekly series at While Reading and Walking. I’m an avid book collector, and each Saturday, I’ll tell the story of one of my signed books. Feel free to join in at #SignedSaturdays.

[praise-the-lord-im-dead]

Reading Update: January 2017

I was on a bit of a Gail Carson Levine kick this month, it seems... • Cinderellis and the Glass Hill by Gail Carson Levine This was SO CUTE. I could read it a million times. (Come to think of it, I may have to buy it for my nieces when they're chapter-book age...) • The Fairy's Return by Gail Carson Levine Again. So adorable. • The Princess Test by Gail Carson Levine 💕 • The Two Princesses of Bamarre by Gail Carson Levine I LOVED the dragon. Honestly, I think she was my favorite part. • The Penderwicks in Spring by Jeanne Birdsall I was able to not bawl for about 1/4 of this. Then I sobbed my way through the rest. (It's not a sad book! Just really, really heavy on the feelings and also relevant to personal experiences and...yeah. I cried a lot). • The Bhagavad Gita by Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa There was a lot of beautiful language and biblical parallels, but I'm still not entirely sure what was going on...it was very beautiful though. • Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett THANK YOU @septembersung for turning me on to the Discworld novels. This was the most epic slice of perfectness I've read in some time (Samuel Vimes is the best. So is Carrot. And Lady Ramkin. And EVERYBODY because this book is GLORIOUS). Oddly enough, most of my reading this month happened on January 1--I picked out a bunch of books and sat in bed all day churning through them. (And, as always, I'm halfway through about 20 various novels, so I've been slowly plugging away at those too) :)

[delicatefury]

Wonderful! It reminds me of several other Cinderella variants like The Anklet as well.

Fairytale retelling: Genderswapped Cinderella

The Golden Shoe

Once there was a princess who was her father’s only heir. When she came of age, a series of balls were held, and the man she would choose to wed would become her country’s next king. Every man in the kingdom, from peasant to prince, was invited, but the princess was pleased with none of them.

Late in the evening, a stranger arrived--a handsome youth, fair to behold, in garments that seemed woven of the light of the stars. For the rest of the evening, the princess would dance with none but him. His manners, his kindness, and his grace impressed her deeply, but before she could ask his name, the great castle clock began to chime the midnight hour. Her partner made his excuses and fled from the ballroom, and though the princess pursued, he had disappeared down the palace stairs by the time the twelfth bell tolled.

The stranger returned to the next evening’s ball, wearing clothes that seemed to glow with the light of the moon, and once again the princess danced with no other. Whispers raced through the ballroom. Who was he? Where was he from? Some claimed him he was a foreign royal, others said he was a notorious outlaw, and still others said he could only be a prince from among fairy-kind. Though the princess stayed by his side all night, she could not pry from him a single answer.

Once again, when the clock struck twelve, her partner began to flee. The princess held his hands and begged him to stay, but he told her that she must allow him to leave before the toll of the midnight bell. When she asked him why, he gave no answer, but fled down the stairs and disappeared so thoroughly that none among the palace guard could find him.

The next morning, the princess spoke to her godmother about the mysterious stranger. Tonight would be the final ball, and there was no other man that she so wished to marry. But her godmother advised her this would not be wise. He could be anyone--an enemy prince, a wicked enchanter, even a beast in human form. If the princess wished to find the truth, she could not let her partner flee at midnight. On her godmother’s advice, the princess ordered that the great palace staircase, down which her partner always fled, would be spread with pitch, in the hopes that it would hold him fast and break whatever spell hid his secrets.

At the final ball, the stranger appeared just as before, in clothes so grand that they seemed to shine as bright and golden as the sun itself. The princess had never been so charmed, or so in love, and she could not even think of another partner. The hours slipped away, until at last the palace clock began to chime twelve.

As before, her partner fled, but this time, his shoes caught in the pitch on the stairs. One foot came free, and the shoe stuck to the stairs, but the other foot remained stuck fast, and there, the princess saw, he still stood when the twelfth bell tolled.

His golden finery faded, leaving her partner clad in ragged clothes. “What have you done?” he cried. “Now I am lost without hope.”

He was prince of a far-off land, and his stepfather was a wicked enchanter, who wished to take the prince’s country for his own two wicked sons. He had kept the prince in ragged servitude, but his power could have been broken if the prince had come to this ball and won the princess’ heart, so long as no one knew his name or nation and so long as he did not stay past midnight. Now he would be taken back to his nation, hidden away among the people. No one would know his name or his face, and none would find him, until the stolen shoe was back upon his foot and the princess claimed him as her beloved.

With that, the prince disappeared, leaving the princess with nothing but a golden shoe stuck to the stair.

Thus the princess journeyed across kingdoms trying the shoe upon every man she met, but finding none whose foot it fit. At long last, weary and ragged, she came upon a cottage in the wood, where lived a young man. His manners were charming, and the princess thought that at last she had found her beloved. She asked him to try the shoe, and when he put his foot within, it fit perfectly. She shouted for joy, and begged him to return to her kingdom with her, where she could claim him as her husband and break the enchanter’s spell.

But as they traveled down the dusty road, a bird fluttered overhead, and bade the princess look again. There was blood in the young man’s shoe, and it fit only because he had cut off his toe. Then she knew him for the enchanter’s son, and fled from him down a dark and lonely road.

There she wandered for days, lost and afraid, until she came upon another cottage. Here she found another young man, kind and fair of face, and her heart rose with hope that she had found her beloved at last. His foot fit within the golden shoe, and she bade him come with her out of this dark forest. They had not gone far before another bird whispered warning, and the princess saw that blood filled this man’s shoe as well. He had cut off part of his heel to fit within the shoe, because he was not her beloved at all, but the enchanter’s other son. The princess fled from him, and was soon lost in the darkness of the forest.

She wandered until she was nearly dead, until at last she came to a tiny hovel in the middle of the woods. There she met an old man, who nursed her back to health and asked to know her story. She told him of her quest to find her lost prince, and he told her that she would surely not find him in these dark woods. No doubt the enchanter held him close to the palace, but the old man promised to show her a path that would take her there, far away from this dark and hopeless forest.

The princess thanked him for her help, but as she was about to take her leave, she saw footprints in the ashes of the hearth. “These are not yours,” she told the old man. “There is another who lives here.”

“It is only my servant,” the old man replied. “A ragged wretch who gathers food and cleans the hearth.”

“All the same,” the princess said, “I should like to try the shoe upon him.”

She followed the ashy footprints until she found a young man in a dirty corner of the kitchen. He was covered in cinders from head to foot and did not speak a word when she asked him his name. Yet she slid the shoe upon his foot and found it fit perfectly. Then her eyes were opened, and she recognized the young man who’d won her heart those months ago.

The old man roared with rage--for he was the enchanter himself--but though he tried to pursue them in the forest, the birds came down from the trees and plucked his eyes from his head, and he could follow them no further.

The princess brought her prince back to her kingdom. She declared before her court that she would marry him and no other. Then his rags and cinders became golden finery once more, and all knew him for the mysterious prince who’d come to the ball. Soon, they were wed and their countries were joined, and if they have not died, they may be living still.

[hotniatheron]

i was obsessed with her princess stories as a kid. it was cinderellis and the glass hill or nothing! 

[fairytale-poll]

ROUND 1B, MATCH 2 OUT OF 16!

Propaganda Under the Cut:

Cinderellis:

I submit him more as early cannon fodder than anything else, though he is a very fun and interesting character to follow in the 150ish page book we find him in, where he fulfills both the Cinderella main points of mythic importance, as well as a Ukrainian fairy tale involving the rule of three and how it applies to precious metals, and the materials one may use on a quest. Also, both he, and the girl he eventually marries are just fun characters to see the viewpoints of.

Danielle:

This series begins after the HEA and Danielle doesn't realize how much magic is really out there in the world. She is a wonderfully complex character who isn't afraid to say what she doesn't know. Really keeps the embodiment of Cinderella as a kind person

[peter-pantomime]

Books

I’m sharing my favorite bits of entertainment (vids, podcasts, music, musicals, TV, stand-up, movies, fics, books, and arts and crafts) to try to help people keep their spirits up!

You can find everything here.

These are some of my favorite books. Enjoy!

Children’s

Picture Books

Dancing in the Wings, The Bunyans, Once Upon a Cloud, The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Going to Sleep on the Farm, Little Bear, Madeline, Eloise, Good Dog Carl, The Monster at the End of this Book

Chapter Books

Magic Tree House, The Secrets of Droon, A to Z Mysteries, Junie B. Jones

Other Media

Classical Kids, The Seal Maiden, Mathmagic, Between the Lions, Cyberchase, Arthur

Young Adult

Series

Once Upon a Time (The Storyteller’s Daughter, Sunlight and Shadow, Midnight Pearls, Golden, Before Midnight), Biddle (The Fairy’s Mistake, Cinderellis and the Glass Hill, For Biddle’s Sake, The Fairy’s Return, The Princess Test), The Royal Diaries (Cleopatra, Eleanor, Kaiulani, Jahanara, Mary, Anastasia), The Ranger’s Apprentice, The Princess Diaries (1-3), Island, Everest, Wayside School, Half Magic, The Children of Green Knowe, A Wrinkle in Time, Percy Jackson and the Olympians

Standalone

The Inquisitor’s Tale, The Two Princesses of Bamarre, Ella Enchanted, Just Ella, Fever 1793, Running out of Time, The Witches, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, The Secret of Platform 13, Which Witch, Dial-a-Ghost, The View from Saturday, A Proud Taste of Scarlet and Miniver, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, The Wish, Holes, Dogs Don’t Tell Jokes, The Boy Who Lost His Face, Who Put that Hair on my Toothbrush, Leap Year, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, The Phantom Tollbooth, Because of Winn-Dixie, The School Story

Comics and Graphic Novels

Star Wars (Princess Leia, Shattered Empire), Paper Girls, Saga, Funhome, Maus, The Prince and the Dressmaker

Fiction

Too Like the Lightning, Priory of the Orange Tree, His Dark Materials, The Sparrow, Bel Canto, Memoirs of a Geisha, The Mists of Avalon, The Last Unicorn, Harry Potter, The Raven Cycle, Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal, Carrie, IT, Death in Venice, Breakfast of Champions, Cat’s Cradle, Candide, Pride and Prejudice, The Grapes of Wrath, Frankenstein, Little Women, The Great Gatsby, The DaVinci Code, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Beloved

Classics and Poets

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking Glass, Peter Pan, The Wizard of Oz, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Odyssey, The Iliad, Euripides Plays, Aeschylus The Oresteia, Sophocles Theban Plays, The Lost Books of the Odyssey, The Penelopiad, A.E. Housman, Mary Oliver, Richard Siken

Ethnographies

The Wordy Shipmates, On Looking, A Rumor of War, The Things They Carried, Mad Dogs, Englishmen, and the Errant Anthropologist, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China

Academic Texts

Gender, Race, and Class in the Media, Cartoon Vision, Understanding Comics, Film Genre Reader IV, Story, Race, Class, and Gender in the United States, Dude, You’re a Fag, Interaction Ritual Chains, Nonviolent Communication, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Textual Poachers, Fandom (ed. Gray), Defining Magic, From Disgust to Humanity, The Sacred and the Profane, Nine Theories of Religion, Theories of Mythology (ed. Csapo)

[the-knights-who-say-book]

Book Review: The Fairy's Return And Other Princess Tales by Gail Carson Levine

I was incredibly nostalgic about finishing this collection. If you enjoy fairytales but have never read Gail Carson Levine's retellings, I strongly suggest you do so right now. They're all clever, genuinely sweet tales that freshen up classics, and are just as enjoyable upon rereading as they were when I was a kid. Here are the titles of each short book, which can be found on their own, if you can’t locate a bind-up (the bind-up is available on hoopla if your library offers hoopla access!):

The Fairy's Mistake — One of my favorites as a kid, still really great! A fairy gives one sister a good spell and gives the other a curse... but the spells have opposite effects

The Princess Test — My other childhood favorite! All those tests that prove who a true princess is? Turns out they might also all apply to a very finicky village girl.

Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep — This is the only one I didn’t read as a kid, and I so enjoyed reading it now. Knowing she’s cursed to sleep for a hundred years when she grows up, a clever princess resists wasting any time sleeping in the meantime.

Cinderellis and the Glass Hill — My dad would read this to me as a kid. It’s still hilarious! Cinderellis can invent anything except a way to earn his brothers’ respect, until he finds a kindred spirit in a disguised princess.

For Biddle's Sake — OH MAN I also loved this one! A girl with green teeth enchants fairies and princes with her dazzling smile and kindness.

The Fairy's Return — This story INVENTED fantasy stories where characters have hilariously specific interests. A baker who specializes in inventing jokes attempts to reunite with his true love.

[commander-ralyle]

Reading "Writing Magic" by Gail Carson Levine, one of my favorite authors. She wrote Ella Enchanted and Fairest, but the stories I know her by are "The Princess Test", "The Fairy's Mistake", "Princess Sonora and the Long Sleep", "Cinderellis and the Glass Hill", "For Biddle's Sake", and "The Fairy's Return". As you can probably guess, they're rewritings of various well known fairy tales or even her originals. Though rewrites like these are brand new originals to me. They're so funny and easy to read! I suggest trying them sometime. She also wrote "Fairy Dust and the Quest for the Egg" which is a Disney Tinkerbell story and something I read after reading the fairy tales. I've read her other stories too and I love them all which is rare for me to love everything one person has written.

I didn't connect all of these stories to her until I found "Writing Magic". If you are going to chose a book on how to write, pick this one. Her writing is amazing and her advice even better. To give some examples, write even five minutes a day, don't let the negative voice get you down, and never ever delete or throw away anything you write until at least 15 years have gone by and even then do not throw it away lightly.

Her advice and stories on how to quiet and make that negative voice helpful really got to me and makes me want to try writing again. I think I really might this time. :) I think I might pull down the stories I wrote and posted and never finished long ago and work on them again.

Oh! Another piece of advice she had was work on 1-3 ideas at a time and only write down the ideas you get during that time with maybe a page of writing before returning to the ideas you have decided to work on. That's another thing that always gets me. X'D

Seriously, get this book. Read it. It's pretty easy to read and is a small book. And hopefully it helps you. :)

[dotrousersmatter]

Callout post for Cinderellis who was fucking shit at naming horses.

[codazura]

“Ellis was always lonely.” - Cinderellis and the Glass Hill, Gail Carson Levine