A raven befriends a young blind girl. He brings her eyeballs he steals from other people, and when she puts them in her eye sockets, she sees memories from their original owners. A man discovers that animals and people will survive almost any wound he inflicts. His experiments become more and more grotesque. A young girl has lost her memories and cannot seem to live up to the expectations of those around her. When a transplanted eye begins showing scenes from the donor’s life, she becomes obsessed with solving a kidnapping. Three story lines are seamlessly interwoven, but the true nature of the connection is only revealed in the final pages.

The title of the novel, Black Fairy Tale, is remarkably apt. Readers who are only familiar with the sanitized Disney versions of fairy tales might not recognize the similarities, but this book certainly feels inspired by some of the darkest tales collected by Alexander Afanasyev, Charles Perrault, and Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. If you’re into that kind of thing, you will definitely enjoy this book; I am, and I certainly did!

Pro:

Good characterisation Great blending of stories Writing Cons:

Nothing really … maybe normalising what should of been horrific, but fits the story.

Oddly enjoyed this book, I didn’t even write many notes as I was reading like I usually do. I’m not sure what genre this would be … horror? … but it’s not what I usually read but I liked it. Saying that makes me feel bad though, considering what happens to the people in it, but oh well.

The book has three interwoven stories that connect with each other. One of them is a story within the story I think, but it relates well with the other ones. All of them are very cinematic, I could really imagine watching them on TV, can even imagine the different kind of shots or music that would go with them. Though thankfully my imagination isn’t that good because some of the visuals would be a bit disturbing.

Since it’s on the cover I’ll start with the story of the raven and the blind girl. The raven just reminded me of the saying – never look a crow/raven in the eye or they’ll steal your soul. That’s almost what he does. Once he catches the eye he takes part of the soul, or what that eye had seen anyway. He doesn’t do it for an evil reason, he’s just completely devoted to girl who became his friend… if it wasn’t so disturbing what he does it would be sweet.

Another one of the stories is about a boy who has the unique ability to keep people and animals alive despite the injury. The story messes with time a bit. Not that there’s time travel, just that it’s not in chronological order, unlike the other tales, which works well for the story really.

Even though what he did with the ability was… no words for it really … I didn’t find him sadistic. He was more just incredibly curious and … pragmatic maybe? The writing was what made it seem like that. It had a way of normalising the horrific things he did, or did for me at least. It only seemed truly evil when we’re in another POV.

Nami, from the last story I found the easiest to connect to. When she loses her memory you can really feel her struggle and how disconnected she felt to everything. Her story was the only time I wrote a note and that was because of the strange use of direct and indirect speech. It started with indirect speech for her in italics, which was a tad confusing since I couldn’t work out if it was speech or thoughts, but that’s beside the point. Then at some point – I didn’t notice when exactly – she has direct speech. I thought it really worked in showing when she came into herself. Or I could have read too much into it, who knows…. well, probably the author or the translator and… I’m going to shut up now.

Either way I really liked this book, despite some of the imagery in it. It was well written and the characterisation is reflected by the writing style. I would recommend this to anyone who likes horror or at least darker tales.

This is an English translation of the original Japanese. I’ve only read one novel written by a Japanese author before. This novelist is incredibly different to Murakami in pretty much every way.

I also don’t read a lot of horror, but I really liked the amount of horror in this book and how it was handled. I only had to skim through a couple of pages of explicit details, and that’s my squeamishness rather than anything that’s the fault of the author.

On the surface, this is a fairy tale in the creepy, older way that the old fairy tales were told before they got Disney-fied. It opens with a short story that we later find out is the product of a college student who wrote fairy tales on the side, someone by the name of Shun Miki, the friendship between a blind girl and a raven that is pictured on the cover of this book.

Part 1 through 4 interweave these narratives with the events that happen to a teenage girl by the name of Nami after she loses her left eye and suffers amnesia. After her eye transplant, she begins to experience visions that appear to be those from the person who donated the eye to her.

This book is amazingly written all the way until the last quarter of it, at which point it dumps a whole lot of unexpected and amazing plot in such a way that I squealed out loud in delight because I couldn’t believe the book could be that clever.

Read this book. Read it now.

Black Fairy tale by Otsuichi is a suprising read. when i first started to read the book i was intrigued by the tale of the raven, after the first chapter I assumed I would be reading a collection of somewhat macabre Fariy Tales- instead i was thrust into an intriguing tale of memories, accidents, and murder. Though the story had some truly disturbing instances you never felt overwhelmed with horror, Otsuichi has a gift for gently exhibiting the grotesque.

I quite enjoyed this book. The character of Nami was particularly compelling. She's a model student, popular with everyone, good at pretty much everything, then her life comes crashing down around her when she loses her left eye and her memory in a freak accident. Now she feels like nothing, she can no longer relate to her friends, and her mother seems to no longer care for the girl she is now. After her grandfather pays for an eye transplant, she suddenly starts seeing the memories of the man the eye came from, including a young girl who has been missing for months, locked in a basement and missing her arms and legs. Nami sets out for the man's hometown to try and find the girl and catch the kidnapper. Along with the main story, we have the Black Fairy Tale, a story of a raven who befriends a young blind girl, bringing her eyes so she can dream of other peoples' lives, and the story of the kidnapper and the strange power he possesses. A great, dark story with lots of suspense and a nice twist at the end.

A chillingly delicious modern fairy tale. Otsuichi is the master of creepy stories. Outstanding visual imagery and captivating writing.

I heard about this book from a friend and her review convinced me to request it from Netgalley. I finished it and woah, it is so dark, but so good.

Despite what the summary says, this book is not "also" about Nami, it's "mainly" about Nami, the girl who has lost her memories, and hence her former personality (and am I the only one to think of Nagi from KHR? Yes? Ok).

Anyway, Nagi receives an eyeball (which is connected to the Raven story and quite against current medical science, if I'm not wrong), and suddenly begins to receive memories from its previous owner. It seems like something terrible has happened, and unhappy at home, Nagi decides to go and set things right for the former owner of the eyeball.

To be honest, I did not expect this to be quite so dark. I have no idea why, though. It's not like the original fairy tales were any happier :p

And I'm really happy to say that I did not see the ending coming. I actually believed Nagi and her reasoning, so the sudden twist came as a surprise to me too.

I really enjoyed this story. I like the dual-perspective narration, and the fact that it interweaves a fairytale as well (although I totally don't understand the author's note at the back). If you're looking for a dark read that is a little different, you should check this book out.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for a free and honest review.

This is indeed a very dark fairy tale of a book. It’s both surreal and delightfully disturbing. From the opening story of a raven that steals eyeballs from other people so the little girl whom he loves can experience sight and the memories of those he robs, to the tale of a young girl whose vision is restored by an eye transplant, to the mystery of the disappearance of another young girl that is somehow tied to those visions, this book grabbed this reader and pulled her in. While it appears to be three (or two and a half) separate stories, BFT is really one book. The writer of the first section appears as a character in the subsequent sections.

Weird in a good way, a Japanese way I suppose, Black Fairy Tale will leave you breathless. It’s a totally unique and entertaining book. I recommend it to those who enjoy strange tales.

I received a free ARC from NetGalley and Shueisha in exchange for an honest review.

This story was really cool! I loved the dual perspectives! Such a dark fairytale!

At first, I didn't really like this story. To be fair, I didn't know what to make of it. The way Nami was treated by her friends and her family after her surgery seemed ridiculously unfair, to the point where it just put me off. But I pushed through with the story. And I'm glad it did. Aside from some highly skeptical science (which I later attributed to magical powers), it really was a good story. Nami's character is unique, and her desire to be accepted is one I can relate to. The creepiness of the story was tantalizing, and it kept me hooked; I was reading this late at night and was definitely a little bit nervous to sleep in the dark! All in all, this is a good novel for teens to read (I don't think an adult audience would really enjoy this sort of work) and I would recommend this novel for anyone who likes horror!

We have a thing for Japanese authors in this house with Rick and I both fans of Haruki Murakami’s works and we have a whole two shelves dedicated to his books and those of other authors on our bookcase and if my copy of Black Fairy Tale wasn’t in e-book form it would be on there too. I’ve been banging on about Rick reading this horror story for weeks now because I know, as a horror and gore fan, he’d love it but he just hasn’t gotten around to it yet.

This book is a translated text (and difficult to track down on Goodreads!) so one can be forgiven for not quite understanding the basis of the story nor the ideas that a) medical science is a rather simple and wonderful thing and b) animals can have human characteristics and that’s totally acceptable.

As an introduction to a story that happens mostly in flashbacks a lonely raven befriends a young blind girl and gifts her with the eyeballs he takes from living people around the land so that she can explore the world through the memories imprinted within their organs. Cut to a young woman called Nami who receives an eye transplant after an umbrella related injury (don’t laugh) and a young man discovers that those within his grasp skip death and continue on living regardless of whatever state, or order, their organs are in.

I don’t think if I bolded, put in capital letters or in a different colour the phrase ‘dark’ you would truly understand what I meant until you read Black Fairy Tale. Mikki, the dude who kills people but somehow doesn’t, is the twisted grown up version of the kid who burns ants with a magnifying glass on the front lawn and Nami is a heartbroken woman wondering far from home to complete the unfinished business of the previous owner of her new eyeball.

A little confusing at times but carefully tied up by Otsuichi, this was a mesmerising tale that certainly isn’t for children

This was a fascinating book - quite mesmeric. The economy of prose was refreshing and the story was part mystery, part family drama and part all out body horror. There were certain sections that lagged a little and the first few pages are a little disorientating, but if you persevere, then the reward is great. I will look out for this author in the future.

Black Fairy Tale is a novel written by Otsuichi, and translated to English by Nathan Collins. A raven who has learned to speak from watching movies befriends a young girl whose eyes were ruined in a freak accident. He brings her eyeballs he steals from other people, and when she puts them in her eye sockets, she sees memories from their original owners. Desperate to make the girl happy, the raven brings her more and more eyeballs. This is also the story of a young girl, Nami, who has lost her memories and cannot seem to live up to the expectations of those around her. The stories intertwine in a haunting, dreamy, horrific narrative evoking the raw and universal need for love.

Black Fairy Tale is a well written tale that is more than a little disturbing. It starts off with what seems like a short story, but quickly we land in a full length novel that brings everything together. the largest part of the story is about Nami- who loses her memory with her eye. She is on the search for her old self, her new self, and a understanding of both. when an eye transplant adds a new set of memories to her list of problems she discovers a new world to become part of. She embarks on a mystery to discover the life and death of the eye donor, and looks to solve the mystery of a kidnapped girl. Family dynamics, personality, and memory are all huge parts of the story. Readers get a look into the mind of the kidnapper, who has a strange power over life and death that they experiment with. the book is definitely dark, and speaks to the nature of memory and the human heart. I enjoyed the gothic, mental suspense style of the horror. There were some gruesome moments, but is more the imagined horror that will stick with readers. My biggest issue with the book is my personal hangup- eyes. Horror movies and moments that include injuries to eyes freak me out every single time. I can still see that scene in Village of the Damned.... *shutter*

Black Fairy Tale is a creepy story with a few twists and turns. Fans of Japanese horror will love this read, but those that are easily scared or squeamish might want to take a pass.