Audiobook Review: In a Glass Grimmly by Adam Gidwitz, Read by Johnny Heller

In a Glass Grimmly by Adam Gidwitz, Read by Johnny Heller, is a companion book to A Tale Dark & Grimm. In this book, a talking frog joins cousins Jack and Jill in leaving their own stories to seek a magic mirror, encountering such creatures as giants, mermaids, and goblins along the way. Based in part on fairy tales from the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen. Like in A Tale Dark & Grimm, there is horror, blood, and some scary moments along with dark humor to make for an entertaining read for everyone around age nine and older.

In a Glass Grimmly takes stories that you might recognize; Jack and Jill, The Frog Prince, The Goblin Market, Jack and the Beanstalk, and many more and offers them up a new- freshly twisted and re-imagined. I really like the style of Gidwitz's writing, with the narrator that speaks directly to the reader (or listener) which reminds me of my much loved The Princess Bride. The narrator gives warnings about and scary or bloody parts, for the most part, in order to prepare anyone willing to keep going. Even when there are parts of the story that are bloody or might normally put me off my lunch, the humor of the warnings and the matter of fact way the less than pleasant moments are described lessen their effect. Jack, Jill, and the frog are all dynamic characters that grow and change as the story progresses, and I liked the lessons that they learned. Rather than luck or strength, it was their wits and honest natures that got the group through some very difficult spots. Readers of A Tale Dark a& Grimm might recognize a few players, but this is very much a companion book and the books can be read in any order. I am already looking forward to reading The Grimm Conclusion, which was released this week.

I would recommend In a Glass Grimmly to everyone from around age 8 on up through adults. Even with the warnings, the scary and bloody moments might be too much from some of the youngest readers, so I recommend taking a read through or listen and judging weather your child is ready for it based on your knowledge of the child. There is adventure and puzzles, humor and a larger moral that all of us would do to remember- that it is better to do as we want rather than as we wish.