Review: 8: The Previously Untold Story of the Previously Unknown 8th Dwarf by Michael Mullin

8: The Previously Untold Story of the Previously Unknown 8th DwarfWritten in verse, this is the previously untold story of the previously unknown 8th dwarf, named Creepy. He is banished to the basement for being different and, well, weird. Yet he plays a vital - and of course previously unknown - role in the popular tale of Snow White (whose title character is an intruder Creepy refers to as "the Maid").



When the author initially approached me with this request I wasn't sure it was my thing but at 24 pages it was worth giving it a go and I actually did enjoy it. it's a nice short read, written in simple verse, nothing complex and nothing detailed but still entertaining.


In 24 pages Mullin manages to take a well known fairytale, give it a new character and tell that story from that character's point of view. It can't be easy to write something like this because the characters have to be developed into something that we enjoy to read about, especially in this one where the poem is based completely around this character's ideas and views of things. I must admit, Creepy was a pretty, well, creepy character and in 24 pages he feels lots of different emotions that really help us to care about this weird dwarf, of course this iks down to some ingenuity on Michael Mullin's front.


I can't say much about storyline apart from that the story intergrated so well into the well known fairytale, despite using a character that didn't exist in it, which is great. Obviously it's very difficult to get much substance out of 24 pages of verse, but I still really enjoyed this one. I really enjoy Mullin's writing and this is just the sort of thing that I like to read to break up the long books that I'm used to reading.


Overall, this was a clever and well written little poem that despite not being amazing is well worth reading because it's only short and a nice little break.


Overall Rating: B



Book received from the author in exchange for an honest review.

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