'The Witch's Boy' - a fun, fractured fairy tale

I have a definite weakness for novels that involve the reimagining of legends and fairy tales. There are plenty of reasons, but two stand out.
First, if the basics of a story are good enough or weird enough or interesting enough to tell repeatedly (as fairy tales usually are), I’m always curious to hear new variations on the theme, the stranger the better.
And second, there’s something irresistible about taking a new look at a familiar story from childhood through the more complex lens of life as an adult. Or young adult, as the case may be.
Luckily for me, there are plenty of novels for adults and children alike about legends and folktales, some more imaginative and captivating than others. One I read recently is Michael Gruber’s young adult book, “The Witch’s Boy,” which is a fresh look at the classic German fairytale of Rumpelstiltskin that’s also peppered with references to altered versions of other famous stories.
Several features make “The Witch’s Boy” a noteworthy addition to the collection of variations on Rumpelstiltskin. Most noticeably, the novel features a long back story for the main character (referred to as Lump, as his full name is a powerful secret) that begins with his adoption by a witch as an infant. Although the story of Lump’s upbringing is entertaining and eventful, Lump himself is far from being a sympathetic character, often causing disastrous problems for his adoptive family and friends because of his immaturity and selfishness.
The traditionally famous part of the story, in which Rumpelstiltskin bargains magic with the miller’s daughter in exchange for her firstborn child, is merely the final straw, so to speak, in a long series of ever worsening crises that bring the selfish, angry Lump to his financial, magical and social ruin.
The story doesn’t quite end there, though, and without giving too much away, I’ll say that the Lump goes a fair way toward redeeming himself for some of the terrible things he’s done to those who love him.
It’s an unexpected twist to find in a story about Rumpelstiltskin but, as I mentioned, it’s not the only time in the book when the motives and morals of traditional fairy-tale characters are turned around. Just a few examples of Gruber’s reworkings of magical stories include a version of Goldilocks as told by bears, a different perspective of Cinderella in which the stepsisters aren’t evil at all, and (my favorite) a story about a Little Red Riding Hood who is befriended by wolves instead of being threatened by them.
All in all, the trend of these alterations seems to provide a pointed commentary about the, well, grimness of Grimms’ famous tales and the ways in which we represent magic as evil and troublesome when we tell fairy tales to children. In place of dubiously simplistic morality, “The Witch’s Boy” presents a complex look at many treasured stories, and I enjoyed the book and the lessons behind it very much.