The Macmillan Fairy Tales Collection

A beautiful hardback treasury, containing over fifty fairy tales from around the world, introduced by award-winning author Michael Morpurgo. The perfect gift for fairy tale lovers of all ages.

This glorious collection contains much-loved favourites from Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grimm, such as The Little Mermaid, Rapunzel and Hansel and Gretel, alongside lesser known fairy tales, such as the Chinese story of Bayberry, who rescues his sister, Little Red, from a devious dragon.

Bringing together amazing stories from across the world, there are tales of witches from Russia, tree ghosts from India, magical moon spirits from Japan and many more. Fully illustrated throughout, with beautiful colour and line-work images from iconic Golden Age illustrators, including Arthur Rackham, Walter Crane and Warwick Goble.

A sumptuous 480 page gift hardback, complete with a foiled cut-through cover, gold foiled edges and a ribbon marker, The Macmillan Fairy Tales Collection is a book to share and treasure.

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I love a good fairy tale collection, even more if they have unusual stories in them, even more if they're illustrated, even more if the whole package is well put together. This is one of the best ones I've seen in a long time. From the gilded pages, to the place ribbon, to the gold details on the back cover - this is absolutely a piece of art, something to treasure.

It's not just to be looked at, though. The stories inside are wonderfully retold, each in a slightly different style - some chatty, some more formal, some with very prescribed language, some with obvious changes from the common version. The forward by Michael Morpurgo includes a sneaky story and sets a high bar for the ones that follow. While you will find the classic stories here - Snow White, Rapunzel, Cinderella - there are also some much less known ones, and even a few I hadn't read before, which is rare with the amount that I've read! The print is large and easy to read, and the illustrations are amazing. The different styles keep things interesting and they're reproduced really well.

It was interesting to read about the history of Macmillan as well, and some of the different collections they've produced over the years. The only thing I would have liked that isn't here is a description of where each story comes from. Some are obvious - the one mentioning the Tsar is probably Russian, one is explicitly set in Scotland and so on, but there are plenty with no particular provenance, and I would have liked to know more. 

This is a fabulous gift, but it's one meant to be read, used and loved. I know my copy will be.