Professor Christine A. Jones and Jennifer Schacker Present Feathers, Paws, Fins, and Claws!
Join Professor Christine A. Jones and her Co-Editor Jennifer Schacker tomorrow evening for
a small reception and presentation followed by a book signing! With the help of Professor Anne Jamison, they will present their latest and lavishly
illustrated collection of vintage fairy tale, Feathers, Paws, Fins, and Claws. The event is kid-friendly, as the book is designed for children and young adults
(and anyone else) who think they are too old to read fairy tales. There will be fancy
treats from Fillings & Emulsions and Passion Flour Bakery, and adult beverages.
A wide variety of creatures walk, fly, leap, slither, and swim through fairy-tale
history. Some marvelous animal characters are deeply inscribed in current popular
culture—the beast redeemed by beauty, the wolf in pursuit of little girls and little
pigs, the frog prince released from enchantment by a young princess. But like the
adventures of many fairy-tale heroes, a curious reader’s exploration in the genre
can yield surprises, challenges, and unexpected rewards. 
Feathers, Paws, Fins, and Claws: Fairy-Tale Beasts presents lesser-known tales featuring
animals both wild and gentle who appear in imaginative landscapes and enjoy a host
of surprising talents. With striking original illustrations by artist Lina Kusaite
and helpful introductions by fairy-tale scholars Jennifer Schacker and Christine A.
Jones, the offbeat, haunting stories in this collection are rich and surprisingly
relevant, demanding creative reading by audiences aged young adult and up. 
Schacker and Jones choose stories that represent several centuries and cultural perspectives
on how animals think and move. In these ten stories, rats are just as seductive as
Little Red Riding Hood’s wolf; snakes find human mates; and dancing sheep and well-mannered
bears blur the line between human and beast. Stories range in form from literary ballads
to tales long enough to be considered short stories, and all are presented as closely
as possible to their original print versions, reflecting the use of historical spelling
and punctuation. Beasts move between typical animal behavior (a bird seeking to spread
its wings and fly or a clever cat artfully catching its prey) and acts that seem much
more human than beastly (three fastidious bears keeping a tidy home together or a
snake inviting itself to the dinner table). Kusaite’s full-color artwork rounds out
this collection, drawing imaginatively on a wide range of visual traditions—from Inuit
design to the work of the British Arts and Crafts movement.
Date: Thursday, May 26, 2016
Time: 6:30 PM
Location:
Weller Book Works
Address:
607 Trolley Square
Salt Lake City, UT 84102