- Imprint: Penguin
- ISBN: 9780241146460
- Length: 368 pages
- Dimensions: 198mm x 35mm x 129mm
- Weight: 500g
- Price: £15.99
Gretel and the Dark
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Gretel and the Dark is a dark historical novel by Eliza Granville connecting a mysterious girl in 1899 Vienna with a child's life in wartime Germany, ideal for readers who enjoy dual narratives, fairy-tale-inflected historical fiction and stories that blur imagination and reality.
Synopsis
Vienna, 1899. Josef Breuer - celebrated psychoanalyst - is about to encounter his strangest case yet. Found by the lunatic asylum, thin, head shaved, she claims to have no name - to be, in fact, not even human. Intrigued, Breuer determines to fathom the roots of her disturbance.
Years later, in Germany, we meet Krysta. Krysta's Papa is busy working in the infirmary with the 'animal people', so little Krysta plays alone, lost in the stories of Hansel and Gretel, the Pied Piper, and more. And then the real world becomes as frightening as any fairy tale . . .
Perfect for readers who like...
Books like Gretel and the Dark
Themes and story elements
Synopsis
Vienna, 1899. Josef Breuer - celebrated psychoanalyst - is about to encounter his strangest case yet. Found by the lunatic asylum, thin, head shaved, she claims to have no name - to be, in fact, not even human. Intrigued, Breuer determines to fathom the roots of her disturbance.
Years later, in Germany, we meet Krysta. Krysta's Papa is busy working in the infirmary with the 'animal people', so little Krysta plays alone, lost in the stories of Hansel and Gretel, the Pied Piper, and more. And then the real world becomes as frightening as any fairy tale . . .
Perfect for readers who like...
- Dark retellings that weave familiar fairy tales into historical fiction.
- Dual narratives whose connection is gradually revealed.
- Stories spanning fin-de-siècle Vienna and wartime Germany.
- Blurring the boundaries between fairy tale and reality.
Books like Gretel and the Dark
- The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw
- The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
- The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
Themes and story elements
- Childhood and trauma
- Historical violence
- Identity
- Memory and imagination
- Jewish persecution
Details
All editions
- Paperback 2015
- Ebook 2014
