©2025 Fable Group Inc.
3.0 

Horse, Flower, Bird

By Kate Bernheimer & Rikki Ducornet
Horse, Flower, Bird by Kate Bernheimer & Rikki Ducornet digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

An imaginative, hauntingly poetic collection of contemporary fables that redefine the fairy tale for the modern woman. In Kate Bernheimer’s familiar and spare—yet wondrous—world, an exotic dancer builds her own cage, a wife tends a secret basement menagerie, a fishmonger’s daughter befriends a tulip bulb, and sisters explore cycles of love and violence by reenacting scenes from Star Wars. Enthralling, subtle, and poetic, this collection of eight tales takes readers back to the age-old pleasures of classic fairy tales and makes them new. Their haunting lessons are an evocative reminder that cracking open the door to the imagination is no mere child’s play, and that delight and tragedy lurk in every corner. “Each of these spare and elegant tales rings like a bell in your head. memorable, original, and not much like anything you’ve read.” —Karen Joy Fowler “These stories are the product of a vivid imagination and crafty manipulation by their skillful creator.” —Publishers Weekly “A strange and enchanting book, written in crisp, winning sentences; each story begs to be read aloud and savored.” —Aimee Bender “Horse, Flower, Bird rests uneasily between the intersection of fantasy and reality, dreaming and wakefulness, and the sacred and profane. Like a series of beautiful but troubling dreams, this book will linger long in the memory. Kate Bernheimer is reinventing the fairy tale.” —Peter Buck, R.E.M. “Quirky, twisted. . . . Quietly unhinged narratives by an author who reinvents the fairy tale.” —Kirkus Reviews “[Bernheimer’s] strangely moving stories, such as the eight collected in Horse, Flower, Bird, combine fantasy with deep wisdom; the illustrations by Rikki Ducornet are an added delight.” —Reader’s Digest “Imaginative. . . . Lean and lyrical writing. . . . Bernheimer’s passion for fairy tales is evident in every story she spins.” —Library Journal

Download the free Fable app

app book lists

Stay organized

Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.
app book recommendations

Build a better TBR

Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool
app book reviews

Rate and review

Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags
app comments

Curate your feed

Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities
app book lists

Stay organized

Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.
app book recommendations

Build a better TBR

Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool
app book reviews

Rate and review

Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags
app comments

Curate your feed

Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities

17 Reviews

3.0
“Modern fairytales that are delightfully dark and exquisitely sad. These chapters feel like prose poems (which I love) and while the text is short with lots of bare space, it somehow feels so full.”

About Kate Bernheimer

Kate Bernheimer is the author of two novels and the children’s book The Girl in the Castle Inside the Museum, a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year. She is also the editor of the literary journal Fairy Tale Review, and three anthologies, including My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me: Forty New Fairy Tales (forthcoming from Penguin in 2010). An Associate Professor and Writer in Residence at the University of Louisiana in Lafayette each spring, she spends the rest of the year in Tucson, Arizona.

An artist and fiction writer, Rikki Ducornet has illustrated books by Robert Coover, Jorge Luis Borges, Forrest Gander, and Joanna Howard. Her paintings have been exhibited widely, including, most recently, at the Pierre Menard Gallery in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the Salvador Allende Museum in Santiago, Chile.

Start a Book Club

Start a public or private book club with this book on the Fable app today!

FAQ

Do I have to buy the ebook to participate in a book club?

Why can’t I buy the ebook on the app?

How is Fable’s reader different from Kindle?

Do you sell physical books too?

Are book clubs free to join on Fable?

How do I start a book club with this book on Fable?

Error Icon
Save to a list
0
/
30
0
/
100
Private List
Private lists are not visible to other Fable users on your public profile.
Notification Icon
Fable uses the TMDB API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDB