A Dinner of Herbs: Tales from Scarborough Fair
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About this ebook
Are you going to Scarborough Fair? Let these tales pass the time as you make your way there...
Parsley: "To the Devil and Back": In this lesbian retelling of "Rapunzel", Jumana, daughter to Ruya the wise woman, is magically locked in the attic. Her only hope now is her friend Nilam...
Sage: "The Wisdom to Know the Difference": Ms. Sophie lives in the house on the corner. If this were a few hundred years ago, everyone would be calling her a witch. Everyone would be right.
Rosemary: "Pray You, Love, Remember": The mortal girl Rosemary was stolen in infancy by the fae. While she loves Underhill, Overhill fascinates her. Can she ever learn to balance her two worlds?
Thyme: "Born to Set It Right": Hina is a Damsel in a different kind of distress: her Hero might as well be a Villain. Can her carefully hidden magic save both her Companion and their Quest?
Elizabeth Conall
There's the poet and the beader and the third-wave feminist, And the queer white Hellenist—I've got them on the list!
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Reviews for A Dinner of Herbs
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Book preview
A Dinner of Herbs - Elizabeth Conall
I loved it. It reminds me a little bit of Shannon Hale's fairy tales, a little bit of Megan Whalen Turner's pseudo-Greek myths, and a lot of Sarah Diemer's The Witch Sea
.
—Sylvia Sybil of What If Books Etc.
A Dinner of Herbs
Tales from
Scarborough Fair
Elizabeth Conall
&
Anne B. Walsh
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2013 Elizabeth Conall & Anne B. Walsh
All rights reserved.
Discover other titles by Elizabeth Conall at Smashwords.com
Discover other titles by Anne B. Walsh at Smashwords.com
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Cat Tales
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of these authors.
DEDICATIONS
From Elizabeth:
To my mom, who uses them all.
Some more often than others.
And to Anne. It's your fault, as usual.
From Anne:
To my dad, who made me learn
what they all looked like.
And to Elizabeth. You started it!
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Content Notes
Foreword
Parsley: To the Devil and Back
Elizabeth Conall
Sage: The Wisdom to Know the Difference
Anne B. Walsh
Rosemary: Pray You, Love, Remember
Elizabeth Conall
Thyme: Born to Set It Right
Anne B. Walsh
About the Authors
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
From Elizabeth:
To all the Dreamwidth users who subscribe to my fannish account who heard my idea about postcard-sized faerie stories fitting into a single narrative and said words to the effect of 'that sounds cool! I want one!' Thank you for saying it was a good idea.
To my mother, my parents' respective sisters, and certain of those Dreamwidth users, who got the postcards. Thank you for your patience with my handwriting. And to certain other of those Dreamwidth users, who didn't get postcards but should have. Thank you for your patience, full stop.
To all the Atheism+ forum users who said 'I would read that' about both Pray
and Devil
. Thank you for giving me hope that someone actually would. And all the Atheism+ forum users who listened to me whining about being afraid I was doing it wrong, who told me to just do it. Thank you for the push.
To all the #yuletide chatters who complain that words are hard (so, all of you). Thank you for the reassurance that it's not just me.
And of course to Anne. Thank you for everything.
CONTENT NOTES
To the Devil and Back
contains self-injury, memory-altering magic, and permanent injury.
The Wisdom to Know the Difference
contains character death.
Pray You, Love, Remember
contains f/m sex and character death.
Born to Set It Right
contains discussion of rape, self-injury, and discussion of torture.
Thank you.
FOREWORD
This collection owes its existence to Mary Robinette Kowal and her Month of Letters project at lettermo.com. Elizabeth acquired a themed collection of postcards (Cicely Mary Barker's Flower Faeries) and decided to write a postcard-sized tale for each, matching the artwork and fitting into an overarching story. When that story's main character received the name Rosemary, the only possible title was Pray You, Love, Remember
.
But what to do with the story afterwards? Enter Anne, fellow fantasy writer and folk music nerd. Having followed the tale of Rosemary with interest, she suggested they give a collection like this a try.
One month later, Elizabeth had also finished To the Devil and Back
, a lesbian take on Rapunzel, inspired by its Italian variant, Petrosinella, or Parsley. Anne's urban fantasy The Wisdom to Know the Difference
draws from the well-loved Serenity Prayer, and her humorous deconstruction of roles in traditional folk tales, Born to Set It Right
, takes its title from Shakespeare's Hamlet.
Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Just turn the page and you'll find yourself there...
Are you going to Scarborough Fair?
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme;
Remember me to one who lives there,
For she once was a true love of mine...
PARSLEY:
TO THE DEVIL AND BACK
Elizabeth Conall
Ummi, Ummi, what have you done to me? Ummi, let me out!
The ivy scent of magic seals Jumana inside the attic. She can shout, she has shouted, all she likes. Her mother will not come.
* * *
Magic is like a seed,
Ruya told Jumana, five years old and green eyes shining at the thought of her first