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Book Club Announcement: The Wild Swans

By Will Willingham 5 Comments

The Wild Swans book club announcement
Once upon a time, in a dark basement office that is not so gloomy as one might think, a writer read a fairy tale that changed the writer’s life.

Okay, that may be an exaggeration. The fairy tale probably did not change the writer’s life, at least not the whole of it. But fairy tales can be like that, having a way of heightening focus on an element of a story to make it larger than life, like a perilous forest or a gleaming castle or an enchanted small something or other. It is probably more true to say that the fairy tale read in the dark but not gloomy basement office offered another way of seeing, perhaps provided a way to frame a matter.

Fairy tales were meant to do this, I believe.

The Wild Swans by Jackie MorrisIn a short while, National Poetry Month will be upon us. We have some fun plans in store, but first, we invite you to participate in poetry’s annual ball by reading a fairy tale with us. We’ll be reading a delightful retelling of the classic fairy tale The Wild Swans, by Jackie Morris. You’ll find the story poetic in its way (and perhaps it will even inspire you to reframe your own matter).

Join us in reading The Wild Swans, and then come meet us in the comments on April 12 and April 19 to use the story as a prompt and write poems to the fairy tale or make found poems with Morris’s words.

Buy The Wild Swans now

Photo by Peter Kaminski, Creative Commons license via Flickr. Post by Will Willingham, author of Adjustments: a novel.

__________________________

Adjustments Front Cover Will Willingham

Adjustments is more than a good novel; it is a fine novel. It is, simultaneously, moving and real and surprising and true. We see ourselves and our personal histories in Will Phillips, Joe Murphy, and Pearl Jenkins. Like Will, we bear scars. In Joe, Pearl, and Cameron, we experience offered hope. This is a story about what matters, and it’s told beautifully well.

—Glynn Young, author of the Dancing Priest series.

BUY ADJUSTMENTS NOW

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Will Willingham
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Will Willingham
Director of Many Things; Senior Editor, Designer and Illustrator at Tweetspeak Poetry
I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel, Adjustments, is available now.
Will Willingham
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Latest posts by Will Willingham (see all)
  • Book Club Announcement: The Reindeer Chronicles - January 11, 2021
  • Adjustments Excerpt: The Dinner Party - September 9, 2020
  • Poet Laura: Difficult to Forecast - August 26, 2020

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Filed Under: Blog, book club, Fairytales, National Poetry Month, The Wild Swans

About Will Willingham

I used to be a claims adjuster, helping people and insurance companies make sense of loss. Now, I train other folks with ladders and tape measures to go and do likewise. Sometimes, when I’m not scaling small buildings or crunching numbers with my bare hands, I read Keats upside down. My first novel, Adjustments, is available now.

Comments

  1. L.L. Barkat says

    March 16, 2017 at 9:52 am

    Really looking forward to this one. Such a great re-telling of the classic fairy tale (and so nicely rich with images and sound and surprising new plot twists!).

    Reply
  2. Sandra Heska King says

    March 16, 2017 at 10:31 am

    Snagged. We were talking about fairy tales last week in Megan’s tea class. I need to dust some off and re-read them with a new eye.

    Reply
  3. Bethany R. says

    March 24, 2017 at 4:46 pm

    I just got my copy and am looking forward to reading this tale for the first time. 🙂

    Reply
    • Will Willingham says

      March 24, 2017 at 5:21 pm

      It’s one of my very favorite stories. And this telling has just a few twists to it to give it a fresh look. I hope you enjoy it. 🙂

      Reply
      • Bethany says

        March 24, 2017 at 11:36 pm

        I’ll start reading tonight!

        Reply

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