Olivia's Reviews > Tatterhood and Other Tales

The stories themselves are great, and also not ones I had read before. However, I found many of the retellings somewhat lackluster, and I was also disappointed by how skewed it was towards European folktales, especially those from the British Isles. For better or worse (and I'm going to pretty confidently go with for worse) Americans have access to a better kept catalogue of European folktales than of folktales from anywhere else in the world, and this was even more evident thirty years ago. While I can understand why this may have hindered Phelps, I expected a book from the Feminist Press to do a better job at presenting stories from all over the globe.

In the end, my lack of excitement over Tatterhood is partly because by the time I was able to read, other feminist collections had grown from what Phelps started. I am grateful for Tatterhood, but it will never hold the same place in my heart that it holds for so many for whom it was the first of its kind.