• Author: Stephen King
• Illustrator: Maurice Sendak
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Publishing year: 2025
• Pages: 48
• Coverart: The Maurice Sendak Foundation / Stephen Stinehour
• Original fairytale created by the Brothers Grimm
• ISBN: 978-0062644695

https://www.harpercollins.com/products/hansel-and-gretel-stephen-king

Review:

Nibble, nibble, little mouse

Everybody remembers a time when they were young and were told the fairytales written by either Hans Christian Anderson or The Brothers Grimm. Folktales, fairytales with a message and as it seems, a lot of these fairytales were much creepier in their original form but were toned down for children in later years.

One of these very famous tales is ‘Hansel and Gretel’ about the brother and sister who live with their father and stepmother (it’s always a stepmother, isn’t it) and when luck is against them, they have to live in poverty. The stepmother has a plan, to get rid of the two children and live with the farmer alone in the house. Hansel hears about the plans and puts pebbles in his pockets and when they go for a walk in the forest the day after he leaves a trail of these little pebbles, allowing them to get back home. An infuriated stepmother plans a second forest walk, deeper into the dark woods this time, and Hansel, who is aware of the danger, fills his pocket with the first thing he can manage to find, bread. He leaves a trail of bread but the birds pick and eat the bread after them. So when the siblings try to find their way back, they can’t and get lost in the woods. Until they come across a little house, made of candy, cookies and gingerbread cake. The children fill their bellies until a haggard voice calls out: “Nibble, nibble, little mouse… Who is nibbling at my house?”

Of course, I don’t need to tell the whole story. I suppose everybody knows the rest, don’t you?

Maurice Sendak, whom I hadn’t heard of before I read this (and I know, people will probably look at me with a side eye now), had drawn sets and costumes for an opera based on the Grimm story of ‘Hansel and Gretel’. He had previously written and illustrated children’s books (one of those I do know, because of its movie adaptation: ‘Where the Wild things are’). Stephen King, author of so many great novels and most recently his own fairytale world, the aptly titled Fairy Tale, in which King incorporated many of the children’s story that brought to live the imaginations of many children and parents, was asked to write a new take on this classic fairytale. Using Sendak’s drawings he managed to retell the children’s story not only for the little people but also for uw grownups.

As a result we get a story we all know but with a little King-twist added to it, accompanied by some of the weirdest and creepiest drawings that inspired Stephen to write the tale anew.

“Once upon a time” will never sound the same, ever again!