| | |  | | Home » Ash | | | | | | | Description: | | Cinderella retold
In the wake of her father's death, Ash is left at the mercy of her cruel stepmother. Consumed with grief, her only joy comes by the light of the dying hearth fire, rereading the fairy tales her mother once told her. In her dreams, someday the fairies will steal her away, as they are said to do. When she meets the dark and dangerous fairy Sidhean, she believes that her wish may be granted.
The day that Ash meets Kaisa, the King's Huntress, her heart begins to change. Instead of chasing fairies, Ash learns to hunt with Kaisa. Though their friendship is as delicate as a new bloom, it reawakens Ash's capacity for love-and her desire to live. But Sidhean has already claimed Ash for his own, and she must make a choice between fairy tale dreams and true love.
Entrancing, empowering, and romantic, Ash is about the connection between life and love, and solitude and death, where transformation can come from even the deepest grief. | | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Malinda Lo | | Hardcover:
| 272 pages | | Publisher:
| Little, Brown Books for Young Readers | | Publication Date:
| September 01, 2009 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 0316040096 | | Product Length:
| 5.75 inches | | Product Width:
| 1.0 inches | | Product Height:
| 8.5 inches | | Product Weight:
| 0.87 pounds | | Package Length:
| 8.3 inches | | Package Width:
| 5.5 inches | | Package Height:
| 1.1 inches | | Package Weight:
| 0.85 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 128 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 128 customer reviews )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
34 of 34 found the following review helpful:
 Gorgeous fairy taleJul 29, 2009
By Shala Kerrigan
I really love re-tellings of classic fairy tales if they are done well, and this is my favorite since Pamela Dean's Tam Lin.
Ash is the Cinderella in the story, and all the elements are there. Magic, fairies, a wicked selfish stepmother, and a Prince who only figures into the story for a moment.
It's a coming of age story, as Ash, who is alone and orphaned makes friends with a fairy who is fascinated with her for reasons she can't understand and with the Royal Huntress. Her step-mother makes her life miserable and she has her moments of escape and love with her friends until she can finally stand for herself and make the choices to make her life better.
The descriptions are lush, and the dialogue is easy and comfortable. The romance in the story is something that builds naturally out of friendship instead of the big crush/fall in love that's entirely too common in YA romance type novels.
I'm highly recommending it to my daughter to read now that I've finished devouring it in less than an evening. It did grab me that hard, that I didn't want to put it down until I was done reading it.
16 of 16 found the following review helpful:
A Young Adult (Girl-Girl) RomanceAug 23, 2009
By 365andMe
Aisling, who goes by Ash in this book, loses her mother at a young age. If her mother had lived, Ash would have learned of fairies and the ways of the greenwitch. Her father didn't believe in such things and neither did her step-mother, closing the door on that path.
After her father's death, Ash lost her place as daughter and was moved into the servant's quarters to pay off his debt. Her only solace was the woods, but she wasn't really alone. Sidhean, opened up a new world, that of the fairies. She also met Kaisa, the King's Huntress, who opened her heart to love.
Told in a Cinderella theme, this isn't your boy/girl young adult love story, but a love that develops between Aisling and Kaisa. In my opinion, ASH is a book long overdue.
16 of 17 found the following review helpful:
A fascinating Cinderella retellingJul 30, 2009
By lenore531
After her mother's death, Aisling (aka Ash) is devastated. And she's inconsolable when her remarried father dies, leaving the family with debts that Aisling's new stepmother forces her to pay off with servitude - so much so that she prays the fairies will take her from the human world. That is until she meets Kaisa, the King's huntress. Because Kaisa teaches her to hunt and ride - and most importantly to value life and love again.
I am a huge fan of fairy tale retellings, especially when they follow the recognized formula but bring some sort of new twist to the story. In case you couldn't tell, ASH is a retelling of Cinderella - with more dangerous fairies and a less over-the-top evil stepfamily than the Disney version.
The tale Debut Author Malinda Lo spins is haunting and powerful enough on its own, but she also weaves in various fascinating dark faerie tales that characters tell each other. Much will probably be made of the fact that Aisling falls for a woman instead of the prince, but in the world of ASH's narrative, it feels like the most natural thing in the world and no one even bats an eye.
10 of 10 found the following review helpful:
 A Rather Different Love TriangleOct 19, 2009
By Patrick Shepherd
"hyperpat"
As rapidly becomes obvious when you read this, this is a re-telling of the Cinderella story. But it's not quite the one you remember from Disney.
Aisling (Ash) is our Cinderella, losing her mother at the age of 13, and her father not long thereafter. There is the traditional step-mother of the original tale, but as depicted here she's not quite an absolutely mean-spirited ogre, but rather truly has a reason for treating Ash as she does. Her step-sisters are still pretty addle-pated, obsessed with their looks and catching a man of means as their ticket to the good life, but here again there's a little more meat placed on the bare bones of this story, as it's not just the prince of the realm that they set their eyes on, but includes the possibility of catching a much older man, considering him to be acceptable merely because he has money, regardless of his character or age, and as such provides some commentary on arranged marriages and the self-imposed bind of people trying to maintain their image and rich lifestyle regardless of the cost.
But beyond these minor revisions, there are two major points of departure from the original. The first is the introduction of the fairy elves, a complete culture in their own right, that used to have a fair amount of regular contact with the 'normal' people, and second is the introduction of the King's Huntress, a nice change from the traditional all-male dominated society of most fantasies. These two items provide the focus for Ash's development, first with her attraction to Sidhean of the elves, and second her attraction to the Kaisa, the current Huntress, which is barely acknowledged by Ash at first, but eventually becomes an overriding force in driving the story to its conclusion.
Sidhean is only lightly drawn, remaining pretty much a dark mysterious character, but there are intimations given that fairy-human affairs, while not impossible, are very rare for good reasons, and are not simple in complexion. Sidhean is this story's replacement for the fairy godmother of the Disney tale, and provides a much darker feel to the overall story. Kaisa is also drawn with only light brush-strokes, and this I felt was something of problem with this book, as I felt the developing attraction between her and Ash needed a deeper exposition to be truly believable. While the acceptance of same-gender relationships is admirably portrayed as just a normal part of this society, not worthy of comment, the feelings Ash has towards Kaisa remain too vague, with inadequate development. Rather oddly, I felt that this story needed a little more romantic treatment, some better hooks into Ash's development from a pre-adolescent to a woman, to make it a fully engaging story.
An interesting twist on the original Cinderella, which some good social commentary nicely folded into the story, but not quite as robust as it could have been with some deeper delving into Ash's development.
---Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)
15 of 18 found the following review helpful:
 Wanted More Faerie TaleSep 07, 2009
By Galleysmith
"Michelle"
Lo has created an interesting premise in this reworking of Cinderella's story. There is absolutely no question of that. The problem is that there was too much going on. Was it a faerie story or was it a story about a girl awakening to the fact that she could be in love with another woman? The broad overview of both stories left me feeling as though Ash was disconnected from both potential romances; there wasn't any passion in either. Given that, I didn't feel the conflict Ash was supposed to be experiencing as she worked to decide which life and which partner to choose.
The latter made me wish we'd had a story without that conflict at all; that it was either Ash in the faerie tale or Ash awakening to her lesbianism all the way through. I understood completely the reason for having both in the story but for me that conflict muddled the eventual love story. Particularly since we also dealt with the overpowering step-mother, the annoying plotting step sister, and bits and pieces of the prince choosing his bride from all eligible ladies of the land. As I said, lots going on.
The faerie story aspect was intriguing and beautifully written. Of the whole story it was that area that drew me in as a reader the most. I wanted to know more about it and see more of it. I wanted Ash to tell us more of the history and interact with its inhabitants much more than she did. The sections where Ash was in the Wood and in that faerie land were so vivid I was excited to experience them.
In the end this book may not have been for me but it was none the less a book that I would encourage anyone interested in experiencing a retelling of Cinderella's story to pick up.
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