Death hasn't visited Rowan Rose since it took her mother when Rowan was only a little girl. But that changes one bleak morning, when five horses and their riders thunder into her village and through the forest, disappearing into the hills. Days later, the riders' bodies are found, and though no one can say for certain what happened in their final hours, their remains prove that whatever it was must have been brutal. Rowan's village was once a tranquil place, but now things have changed. Something has followed the path those riders made and has come down from the hills, through the forest, and into the village. Beast or man, it has brought death to Rowan's door once again. Only this time, its appetite is insatiable. A YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Pick [STAR] "With stylish prose, richly developed characters and well-realized worldbuilding, Templeman plumbs archetypes of folklore to create a compelling blend of mythic elements and realistic teen experience."-Kirkus Reviews, Starred [STAR] "This has both the stylish beauty of those [classic fairy] tales and the chilling darkness that makes them timeless."-The Bulletin, Starred “The legion of Maggie Stiefvater fans out there ought to look this way.”-Booklist

After the murder of her cousin, everything changes for sixteen-year-old Rowan, who must not only seek the evil forces responsible before they destroy her family and village, but also set aside her studies when she becomes betrothed.

The tyrannous Huntsmen have declared everyone in one village to be outlaws, since they insist on supporting the magical beings of neighbouring Darkwood. Why won’t they accept that magic is an abomination? Far from being abominable, the residents of Darkwood are actually very nice when you get to know them, even Snow the White Knight, who can get a bit tetchy when people remind her she’s a Princess. In order to stop the Huntsmen from wiping out all magical beings, Snow and her friends have to venture into the Badlands of Ashtrie, and seek the support of the Glass Witch – but she has plans of her own, and let’s just say they’re not good ones. Praise for Gabby Hutchinson Crouch: ‘Gabby is one of the funniest writers I know.’ Sarah Millican ‘...very funny. If you like Terry Pratchett, or think gothic fairytales should have more LOLs, ’tis the book for ye.’ Greg Jenner ‘I have read this and it is great. Pratchetty fun for all the family.’ Lucy Porter ‘...magical, surprising and funny.’ Jan Ravens What people are saying about the Darkwood series: ‘Clever and funny and so very very entertaining. I would encourage everyone of every age to go ahead and read Darkwood.’ ‘Completely fabulous, can’t wait for the rest of the series.’ ‘A fun, exciting, action-packed story that once I started reading I couldn't put down.’ ‘I loved the mix of humour and fantasy, the tongue in cheek style of writing and the quirky characters.’ ‘I could go on and on about how much I love this book and why.’ ‘A delightful new mashup of old familiar fairy tale characters and themes, with loads of originality and memorable characters. ... I think this may well turn into one of my all-time favourites.’ ‘...incredible! It made me laugh out loud in several places, but also managed to pull off some intricate themes around power and bigotry – I adored the characters and the fun, genre-savvy writing.’

Laurence Talairach-Vielmas explores Victorian representations of femininity in narratives that depart from mainstream realism, from fairy tales by George MacDonald, Lewis Carroll, Christina Rossetti, Juliana Horatia Ewing, and Jean Ingelow, to sensation novels by Wilkie Collins, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Rhoda Broughton, and Charles Dickens. Feminine representation, Talairach-Vielmas argues, is actually presented in a hyper-realistic way in such anti-realistic genres as children's literature and sensation fiction. In fact, it is precisely the clash between fantasy and reality that enables the narratives to interrogate the real and re-create a new type of realism that exposes the normative constraints imposed to contain the female body. In her exploration of the female body and its representations, Talairach-Vielmas examines how Victorian fantasies and sensation novels deconstruct and reconstruct femininity; she focuses in particular on the links between the female characters and consumerism, and shows how these serve to illuminate the tensions underlying the representation of the Victorian ideal.

Magic is forbidden in Myrsina, along with various other abominations, such as girls doing maths. This is bad news for Gretel Mudd, who doesn’t perform magic, but does know a lot of maths. When the sinister masked Huntsmen accuse Gretel of witchcraft, she is forced to flee into the neighbouring Darkwood, where witches and monsters dwell. There, she happens upon Buttercup, a witch who can’t help turning things into gingerbread, Jack Trott, who can make plants grow at will, the White Knight with her band of dwarves and a talking spider called Trevor. These aren’t the terrifying villains she’s been warned about all her life. They’re actually quite nice. Well... most of them. With the Huntsmen on the warpath, Gretel must act fast to save both the Darkwood and her home village, while unravelling the rhetoric and lies that have demonised magical beings for far too long. Take a journey into the Darkwood in this modern fairy tale that will bewitch adults and younger readers alike. Praise for Gabby Hutchinson Crouch: ‘Gabby is one of the funniest writers I know.’ Sarah Millican ‘...very funny. If you like Terry Pratchett, or think gothic fairytales should have more LOLs, ’tis the book for ye.’ Greg Jenner ‘I have read this and it is great. Pratchetty fun for all the family.’ Lucy Porter ‘...magical, surprising and funny.’ Jan Ravens What people are saying about the Darkwood series: ‘Clever and funny and so very very entertaining. I would encourage everyone of every age to go ahead and read Darkwood.’ ‘Completely fabulous, can’t wait for the rest of the series.’ ‘A fun, exciting, action-packed story that once I started reading I couldn't put down.’ ‘I loved the mix of humour and fantasy, the tongue in cheek style of writing and the quirky characters.’ ‘I could go on and on about how much I love this book and why.’ ‘A delightful new mashup of old familiar fairy tale characters and themes, with loads of originality and memorable characters. ... I think this may well turn into one of my all-time favourites.’ ‘...incredible! It made me laugh out loud in several places, but also managed to pull off some intricate themes around power and bigotry – I adored the characters and the fun, genre-savvy writing.’

The magnificent title story of this collection of fairy tales for adults describes the strange and uncanny relationship between its extravagantly intelligent heroine--a world renowned scholar of the art of story-telling--and the marvelous being that lives in a mysterious bottle, found in a dusty shop in an Istanbul bazaar. As A.S. Byatt renders this relationship with a powerful combination of erudition and passion, she makes the interaction of the natural and the supernatural seem not only convincing, but inevitable. The companion stories in this collection each display different facets of Byatt's remarkable gift for enchantment. They range from fables of sexual obsession to allegories of political tragedy; they draw us into narratives that are as mesmerizing as dreams and as bracing as philosophical meditations; and they all us to inhabit an imaginative universe astonishing in the precision of its detail, its intellectual consistency, and its splendor. "A dreamy treat.... It is not merely strange, it is wondrous." --Boston Globe "Alternatingly erudite and earthy, direct and playful.... If Scheherazade ever needs a break, Byatt can step in, indefinitely." --Chicago Tribune "Byatt's writing is crystalline and splendidly imaginative.... These [are] perfectly formed tales." --Washington Post Book World

Using data from archaeological excavations, patent filings, and marketing catalogs, this book provides a broad view of the introduction, spread, and use of mass-produced coffin hardware in North America. At the book's heart is a standardized typology of coffin hardware that recognizes stylistic and functional changes and a fresh look at the meanings and uses of the various motifs and decorative elements. Within the discussion of mass-produced coffin hardware in North America is new work connecting the North American industry with its British antecedents and a fresh analysis of the prime factors that led to the introduction and spread of mass-produced coffin hardware. Extensively illustrated with examples of coffin hardware to aid scholars and professionals in identification.