taking place here
Warning: There will be spoilers in this post. If you've not read Scarlet yet, don't say I didn't warn you.
I was actually surprised at how few parallels I could draw between this book and the original tale of Little Red. Maybe that's because I don't know that fairytale as much as I might like, or maybe it's just because I read the book so quickly. (Like 24 hours quickly. That just means it was awesome though. Right?)
Let's get started with the obvious - the ones that I think everyone probably saw.
First we have the Grandmother. In the original tale, Red is headed to her house with a basket of food. In this story, Scarlet lives with her - currently missing - Grandmother and they have a … wait for it! … farm. Love the little hints to the fairytale there.
The next, very obvious connection is Wolf. I think just the name there is probably the biggest connection - because really, to me Wolf didn't act much like the Big Bad Wolf. Which is pretty awesome, as this gives the story much more of a 'is he a good guy or a bad guy?' vibe.
Then there's Scarlet's red hoodie - instead of a red cloak. I gotta admit, I'm not sure how good a red hoodie would look on someone that has such red hair, but I do love how it's acknowledged that the hoodie is red (like when she pulls it off to better camouflage herself in the wood) and how she feels more comfortable with it on.
France! I love how the setting for this book is France and how one of the earliest (if not the earliest) version of this story was one told by French peasants. Also, the first printed version of the tale was included in a collection of tales by Frenchman Charles Perrault.
Now a couple of other lovely additions that I didn't remember from the first time around.
Does everyone remember the fight ring that Wolf was part of, over at the farmhouse next door to Scarlet and her Grandmother? Well, when Scarlet went over there to find Wolf, he was just about ready to step into the ring with an opponent called 'Hunter'. I thought this was a wonderful little 'cookie' in the story, as the man could have been called anything, but it was a direct reference to the original tale instead.
Finally, after Scarlet is captured by the Wolves, she is taken to see her Grandmother. Only… Cue the 'Grandmother, what big teeth you have'. Okay, so, that wasn't actually said or even implied, but dear old granny was a fake and was actually one of the Wolves in disguise. I love this part so much because, not only was it awesome and creepy and perfectly in keeping with a certain twisted mentality, when the reader realizes what's going on, it's all 'just like the fairytale'.
So, those are the tidbits I noticed. How about you? Which ones did you see? Did I miss any? Do you think I'm totally crazy for drawing the parallels between these that I did? Let me know!
