Showing results by publisher "Audible Studios" in Fairy Tales, Folk Tales & Myths

Long ago there was only sun in the rainforest. It was beautiful but too bright. People had a hard time sleeping. A farmer was married to the River Snake King's daughter, and she told her husband about something called "Night" that was deep in the river. It would let people rest. They had too much farm work to do, so they sent three friends in a canoe down the river to ask the River Snake King for Night.

Everyone thinks they know the real story behind the villains in fairy tales - but the villains themselves beg to differ. In Troll's-Eye View, you'll hear from the Giant's wife ("Jack and the Beanstalk"), Rumpelstiltskin, the oldest of the Twelve Dancing Princesses, and many more. A stellar lineup of authors, including Garth Nix, Jane Yolen, and Nancy Farmer, makes sure that these old stories do new tricks!

Thirteen award-winning fantasy and science fiction writers offer up their versions of these classic fairy tales as well as other favorites, including The Ugly Duckling, Ali Baba, Hansel and Gretel, and more. Some of the stories are funny, some are strange, and others are dark and disturbing - but each offers something as unexpected as a wolf at the door.

With her black hair, red lips, and lily-white skin, Summer is as beautiful as her father's garden. And her life in the mountains of West Virginia seems like a fairy tale; her parents sing and dance with her, Cousin Nancy dotes on her, and she is about to get a new baby brother. But when the baby dies soon after he's born, taking Summer's mama with him, Summer's fairy-tale life turns grim. Things get even worse when her father marries a woman who brings poisons and magical mirrors into Summer's world. Stepmama puts up a pretty face, but Summer suspects she's up to no good....

In The Fairy's Mistake, two very different sisters have two very different encounters with the fairy Ethelinda. Rosella is kind and helpful. Her reward: Jewels and gems tumble out of her mouth whenever she speaks. Myrtle is rude and spiteful. Her punishment: Bugs and vipers slither out of her mouth. The fairy Ethelinda feels she's meted out justice just right - until she discovers Rosella has been locked up by a greedy prince and Myrtle is having the time of her life!

The young maiden, Parsley, will eat nothing but parsley, which in Snettering-on-Snoakes grows only in the fairy Bombina's garden. All is well - until Bombina is released from the fairy queen's dungeon. Her crime? Failing to get along with humans. And turning them into toads! Meanwhile, twin princes Randolph and Rudolph are causing trouble at Biddle Castle and pinning everything on their younger brother, Tansy. Prince Tansy cares about Biddle. Randolph and Rudolph don't. But one of the twins will be king, unless Prince Tansy accepts help from a green Biddlebum Toad!

Turning thirteen starts off with a bang for Lily. Literally. A birthday present explodes on her porch... and soon after a trio of leprechauns (yes, leprechauns) appears in her bedroom. They whisk her away to a land of clover, pixies, a new friend, a cute boy, and lots of glimmering, glittering gold. A world of Green. It turns out that Lily, like her grandmother before her, is next in line to be keeper for the Clan of Green, and in charge of all their gold. That is, if she passes three tests. And she has to pass them. Because if she doesn’t she may never get to go home again.

The werlings of Hagwood live peacefully in the trees of the forest - overlooked and unbothered while they leisurely perfect the art of wergling (shape-changing). But unlike his fellow werlings, the bumbling Gamaliel Tumpin can’t manage to wergle into even the simplest of forms - a mouse - like his peers. He’s tormented by his sister, Kernella, and teased by his classmates. And he envies star student Finnen Lufkin, who can transform into almost any creature.

Ark lives a mile up from the ground - in the last trees in the world. But Ravenwood faces a new threat by the empire that wants its precious wood. Ark and his friends must travel deep into enemy heartland to find out what evil is planned. Awaiting them is a glittering forest of glass skyscrapers, a twisted echo of home.

After their near-fatal battle with Poseidon, Charlotte and Zee would love nothing more than to relax and forget all over again that the Greek gods are real. But with the world in peril and no one else to save it, that just isn’t an option. Charlotte and Zee meet the Prometheans, an ancient brotherhood trying to protect mankind from the whims of the gods, who think they might have finally found a weapon capable of bringing Zeus to his knees. But using this weapon will come at a great cost, one Charlotte and Zee are not willing to pay.

A classic fable from Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories, read by Johnny Morris. Have you ever wondered how and why the animals came to be as they are? In these magical tales, drawn from stories he heard as a child in India as well as on folk traditions he later collected all over the world, Rudyard Kipling gives some wonderfully imaginative explanations.

Max’s village is absolutely normal in every single way and on every single day—except Wednesday. Most of the townsfolk shutter their windows and lock their doors to hide away from the many peculiar things that happen—things like cats getting stuck in the vacuum cleaner and birthday cakes meeting fiery and horrific ends. But Max is too curious for that, and so, breaking every rule in the village, he searches out the cause of all the Wednesday weirdness.

The Magic Factory is where Midden and her team of helpers come up with magical answers to all sorts of problems. In these four fun stories, they must stop the terrible twins from terrorising the town; round up some runaway scissors; save school from a spell disaster and catch an invisible imp, all before the Halloween party!

A woodcutter and his wife are desperate for a child - even one as small as his father's thumb. So Merlin and the Faerie Queen grant their wish, and Tom Thumb is born! A magical retelling of the classic tale, read by Stephen Mangan.

Oh, it's not the very cute kitten that appears out of nowhere and demands to go home with her. It's not the sudden arrival of her cousin Zee, who believes he's the cause of a mysterious sickness that has struck his friends back in England. It's not her creepy English teacher Mr. Metos, who takes his mythology lessons just a little too seriously. And it's not the white-faced, yellow-eyed men in tuxedoes, who follow Charlotte everywhere. What's so extraordinary is not any one of these things.... It's all of them.

What do witches do when their wands break? Where do wizards shop for stuff for spells? And if you were a ghost who wasn't scary enough, where would you find help? The Magic Factory! It's where Midden and her team of helpers come up with magical answers to all sorts of problems.

A lonely pair of magic boots are locked up in a tower and in need of good home. Titch and Mitch would dearly love to have them, but the boots have other ideas...Escaped lions, mercy missions, a turkey with special powers, Christmas chaos and some very strange cheese! These two pixies take it all in their stride.The fourth fantastic 'Titch and Mitch' story from best-selling author Garth Edwards.

He had likewise, by another wife, a young daughter, but of unparalleled goodness and sweetness of temper, which she took from her mother, who was the best creature in the world. No sooner were the ceremonies of the wedding over than the mother-in-law began to show herself in her true colors. She could not bear the good qualities of this pretty girl, and the less because they made her own daughters appear the more odious. She employed her in the meanest work of the house.

Ever since Charlotte Mielswetzski and her cousin, Zee, saved the world, life has been rather ordinary. Ordinary, that is, if you call being ultramegagrounded (in Charlotte's case) or treated as if you might fall to pieces (in Zee's case) ordinary. Either way, heroes deserve better. Of course, no one knows Charlotte and Zee are heroes. It's not like they can simply announce that Greek myths are real or proclaim they have returned from the Underworld, where they rescued all of mankind from Philonecron, a deranged demigod with delusions of grandeur.

The classic story of Beauty and the Beast....