Genre

Fairy Tale Retellings

Retellings rework familiar tales — Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, Bluebeard, the Snow Queen — from new angles: the villain's side, a queer romance, a gothic or steampunk setting. Part of the fun is spotting the original beneath the new story.

Want the originals? The Grimm and Andersen collections are free in our classic fairy tales section.

This list collects 381 books tagged Fairy Tale Retellings by 276 authors, published between 1865 and 2026. 6 are free to read and 3 have a free audiobook. Books are ranked by how many readers have shelved, rated or downloaded them.

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Common tropes in Fairy Tale Retellings

From Wikipedia

A fairy tale is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful beings. In most cultures, there is no clear line separating myth from folk or fairy tale; all these together form the literature of preliterate societies. Fairy tales may be distinguished from other folk narratives such as legends and explicit moral tales, including beast fables. Prevalent elements include dragons, dwarfs, elves, fairies, giants, gnomes, goblins, griffins, merfolk, monsters, monarchy, pixies, talking animals, trolls, unicorns, witches, wizards, woodwoses, magic, and enchantments.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

381 Fairy Tale Retellings books · page 1 of 8

Top Fairy Tale Retellings authors

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Frequently asked questions

What are the most popular Fairy Tale Retellings books?

By reader shelving on Open Library and downloads, the most popular include The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1899), Circe (2018), Cinder (2011), Black Beauty (1877) and Heartless (2000).

Are there free Fairy Tale Retellings books?

Yes — 6 fairy tale retellings titles are in the public domain and free to read, including The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1899), Black Beauty (1877) and Stories from the Ballads, Told to the Children.