REVIEW: “If We Live to be Giants” by Allison Mulder

Review of Allison Mulder, “If We Live to be Giants,” Small Wonders no. 4 (October 2023): 25-28 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Content note: Domestic abuse.

This was a shudderingly sad story of two girls’ escape — and their mother’s escape — from an abusive grandfather. It’s the kind of story that makes you think there must be something behind it, a reason why the author chose to wrote this story rather than another one. I hope the exorcism of writing it helped.

(First published in Fireside Magazine 47, 2017).

REVIEW: “The Backwards Princess of Unusual Parentage” by Allison Mulder

Review of Allison Mulder, “The Backwards Princess of Unusual Parentage”, Luna Station Quarterly 47 (2021): Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

One of my favorite genres of speculative fiction is “pick a minor character in a fairy tale and turn them into a major character”, and Mulder’s story fits squarely in that category. The minor character in this case is the mirror from Snow White — who is he? How did he get in the mirror? Why does he do the bidding of the one who looks inside him? These are all questions you’ve probably never thought of before but Mulder faces them head on in this delightful, intriguing, and unexpected fairy tale. I loved it.