Book of a Thousand Days

by Shannon Hale

This beautifully written, lyrical novel is based on a lesser-known Grimm Brothers fairy tale. Though the plot is engaging, and the characters appealing, it's the language that drew me through the story. Book of a Thousand Days reads more like poetry or a song, than like prose. It has more striking similes than I can remember encountering in a novel before. Phrases like "his soul slipped back inside, curled up like a cat in his chest, and purred to be home," and "I was under the stars like a fish is under water," and "in a few months' time winter would whack us dead like a yak's tail slaps a fly," run all through the text. Since Dashti, a peasant girl and the main character of the story, has learned to sing all the healing songs from her mother, the lilting quality of the language perfectly complements the events of the plot. And healing is one of the main themes--healing of body and soul. This is a story full of cruelty, privation, and destruction, yet Dashti's songs keep the tone light and hopeful. The structure of this book is in Dashti's diary entries as she and her mistress Saren are bricked up in a tower by Saren's father for seven years, without light or fresh air, because she wouldn't agree to marry the man her father had chosen for her. After half that time, they manage to break themselves out, only to find that the lady's home city has been utterly destroyed by the man she was to marry. They travel on to the city of Khan Tegus, the ruler of a neighboring kingdom, and the man Saren wants to marry. There they find work in the palace kitchen, and Dashti waits for an opportunity to make Saren's presence known to Tegus. Though Dashti is allowed to sing her songs of healing to the khan, Saren is too afraid to reveal herself, and Dashti falls in love with Tegus herself. In the end, both Saren and Dashti gain happiness through separate acts of bravery. And everyone lived happily ever after. --reviewed by Dail Sams