The Sleeper and the Spindle by Neil Gaiman and performed by a full cast

Summary from Goodreads:

A thrillingly reimagined fairy tale from the truly magical combination of author Neil Gaiman and illustrator Chris Riddell – weaving together a sort-of Snow White and an almost Sleeping Beauty with a thread of dark magic, which will hold readers spellbound from start to finish.

On the eve of her wedding, a young queen sets out to rescue a princess from an enchantment. She casts aside her fine wedding clothes, takes her chain mail and her sword and follows her brave dwarf retainers into the tunnels under the mountain towards the sleeping kingdom. This queen will decide her own future – and the princess who needs rescuing is not quite what she seems. Twisting together the familiar and the new, this perfectly delicious, captivating and darkly funny tale shows its creators at the peak of their talents.

Lavishly produced, packed with glorious Chris Riddell illustrations enhanced with metallic ink, this is a spectacular and magical gift.

Review:

This was so entertaining. I wish it was longer. It’s a very short book (1 disc on audio). Though, reading that summary made me want to go back and look at the physical book too because clearly I missed out on the illustrations. However, what I got was one beautifully performed play. I’ve never listened to an audiobook like this before. Each character was read/performed by a different voice actor.

First off, the story is a lot of fun. I’m a sucker for retold fairytales. And who better to write one then Neil Gaiman? I love Neil Gaiman and when I saw he had a new YA book, I quickly put a request in for it at my library. Then I saw the audiobook had a full cast and well that was it.

This story was part serious, part joke, and part epic storytelling. Seriously, I was laughing the whole time. I loved getting dwarves as main characters. They were loud, wise, vocal, and hilarious. This was not a book that held back on language. Those dwarves had mouths on them. The Queen (other main character) was so epically awesome too. She left her soon-to-be prince to go rescue a town of innocent people. She never seemed too afraid. She marched strongly into a cursed town and really was such a hero.

Also, the dark, almost creepy elements of the story were so pure Neil Gaiman. It was easy to forget that this was his story and not some BBC special. But then, there’s evil spells that allow the sleeping townspeople (of the Sleeping Beauty Tale) come to partial life and go after the main characters as sort of sleeping zombies. And I went, oh yea, this is Neil Gaiman. There was jus the right amount of adventures and twists too.

I highly recommend this one. I can’t think of anything negative to say, besides the fact that I wished there was more. I’m sure the book is beautiful, but if you listen to audio at all and love a good comedy, I’d go for the audio for sure. I give it a 10/10.