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Deerskin
 
 
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Deerskin (School & Library Binding)

by Robin McKinley (Author) "MANY YEARS LATER SHE REMEMBERED HOW HER PARENTS HAD looked to her when she was a small child: her father as tall as a tree,..." (more)
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (133 customer reviews)

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Product Description

From Library Journal

Heir to her late mother's legendary beauty, Princess Lissar becomes the victim of her grief-maddened father's desire. Fleeing her home, she seeks solace and solitude in a great forest--and discovers a magic that leads her toward healing and justice. Loosely based on "Donkeyskin," an obscure fairy tale by Charles Perrault, this story of a young woman's survival and recovery is both a classic hero's journey-tale and a parable for modern times. Award-winning YA author McKinley turns her storytelling acumen and stylistic grace toward an adult audience, handling incest and rape with unflinching honesty while at the same time building a case for hope and renewal. A good choice for fantasy collections.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.


From Kirkus Reviews

A first foray into adult fantasy for the author of such well- received children's books as The Outlaws of Sherwood (1988), etc. In an unnamed, standard fantasy kingdom, an unnamed queen dies after bequeathing to her unnamed king a portrait capturing her surpassing beauty. Their daughter, the princess Lissla Lissar, is the very image of her mother, even to her black-red hair. On Lissar's 17th birthday, the king announces that he will marry his daughter! Horrified, Lissar locks herself away, but the king breaks in to beat and rape her. Barely alive, Lissar escapes with her dog Ash to find sanctuary in the mountains. The moon goddess, the ``Lady,'' heals Lissar--suppressing the dreadful memories, changing her hair to white, giving her a stainless white deerskin dress--and four years pass in what seems a day. Now Lissar enters a neighboring kingdom, where she meets the dog-fancying prince Ossin. As she slowly regains her memory, so she falls in love with Ossin, who proposes. Unable to tell him of her past, Lissar again flees into the mountains, returning the following year ready to denounce her father, regain her black-red hair, and marry Ossin. Turgid, lurid, soporific fluff. Might have made an adequate fairy tale at a twentieth of the bulk. McKinley will have to do much better than this to capture an adult audience. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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MANY YEARS LATER SHE REMEMBERED HOW HER PARENTS HAD looked to her when she was a small child: her father as tall as a tree, and merry and bright and golden, with her beautiful black-haired mother at his side. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews

133 Reviews
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4 star:
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3 star:
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2 star:
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Average Customer Review
4.1 out of 5 stars (133 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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4.0 out of 5 stars pretty good, May 5 2008
By greatedcorn (canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Deerskin (Paperback)
this is a retelling of the story donkey skin. a short summery of the book would be; after the death of a girl's mother, her father abuses her out of grief and she runs away, and i think she takes her dog with her (it's been a while since i've read it). she kind of looses herself because of her grief at what her father did in the wilderness and after a while comes to this castle, wearing a deerskin dress, and they take her in and call her deerskin, and there's a prince etc. i won't spoil the ending.

there is an odd obsession with dogs in this book, as the girl (princess) has her own dog and also takes care of the prince's puppies. i don't have a dog or care about them much, so while fascinating, this part of the book didn't really draw me in and dragged on a bit at parts. there was a nice symbolism present and the heroine did regain a sense of herself and an acceptance of herself by the end of the book. overall not my favourite read, but decent. worth it if you put in the time, but nothing mind blowing.
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4.0 out of 5 stars Mixed feelings, Dec 11 2007
By Jana (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Deerskin (Paperback)
I think my true rating for this novel hovers somewhere between 3 and 4, and to be honest, having just finished this book -- I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it.

Some points:

-- In the begining, I really enjoyed the somewhat vague voice of Lissar as it seemed to fit well with the fairy tale elements of the novel, but by the end I found it frustrating, as despite the very detailed descriptions of pain, sorrow, misery, etc. we were given, I never felt as though I actually got to know anything about her.

-- Why did her physical healing seemingly take an insanely long amount of time? Months? Years? She really spends five years in the mountains??? Why does it seem only like one winter before spring arrives and Lissar ventures from her hut again?

-- I like my villains fully developed. The father was not. In the end as she confronts him -- it's very dissapointing. I would have liked a greater insight into his mind.

-- I really wish that Ash had been made a male dog instead, because I couldn't distinguish in many sentences whether Lissar or Ash were being refferred to!

-- The writing is quite beautiful and intelligent and suprisingly free of cliches, especially considering this is a fantasy novel -- but it could have done with some more careful editing because many sentences are rather clunky and confusing.

-- As Lissar is an only child and the princess and heir of a vast and rich kingdom, I find it hard to believe that either her parents or court would have actually neglected her to the point that they did.

-- Her journey of self-discovery and healing is the essential part of this novel, but did it have to be so LONG and REPETITIVE?

-- The romance was dissapointing. Very, very dissapointing. Many others have commented on this as well -- but I just had to restate it.

Regardless, I did enjoy the story, but it will not become one of my favourites and as such, I think it will be a very long time before I reread it.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Not great, But so what?, Nov 16 2005
By A Customer
This review is from: Deerskin (Paperback)
Well, I will admit that I didn't really like reading all of part one, mainly at the beginning becuase all it was was explaining a bunch of stuff that I pesonally realy didn't think was worth knowing. However, when i got to the rest of the story i couldn't put it down! I was so into it! It is definatly a girl story, and I wouldn't recomend it to a boy, but the story was good. I would like to tell all those who have read the first part and no further that the dog does live. So if you weren't reading it because of this, keep going.
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 		 Most recent customer reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars But what of the child of a "true love" story?
I just finished rereading "Deerskin", which was part of the origins of my alias "Ash" on various music message board (like ChrisCaffery dot com - of the group "Savatage") Great... Read more
Published on Jul 6 2004 by Mary Gollihugh

1.0 out of 5 stars Worst Book I Ever Read
I just loved Robin McKinley's 'The Blue Sword', it is one of my favorite books of all time. Her book about Aerin was Okay, not one of my favorites, so I did read some of the... Read more
Published on Jun 11 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars One of her Best
I've read Deerskin at least four times! I find it extremely interesting and enjoyable. There is a rape scene, which can be disturbing, but isn't as graphic or... Read more
Published on May 31 2004 by Rachel

5.0 out of 5 stars Fairy tales don't come true ... and that's ok.
I love this book. I've read it 4 times.

It begins like a classic fairy tale as the Princess Lissla Lissar learns about the courtship and marriage of her parents. Read more

Published on May 19 2004 by Raein2001

3.0 out of 5 stars Take the Good with the Bad
It's the tale of your usual most-beautiful-princess - with a twist. Her father decides to marry her after her mother's death, the tale has a rather graphic assault scene to end... Read more
Published on April 15 2004 by Essay

3.0 out of 5 stars Not too good, but not bad either.
While I wouldn't go so far as to say this book was excellent, I would have no qualms about giving it to children just because of the incest themes. Read more
Published on Mar 29 2004 by Nonesuch Explorers

2.0 out of 5 stars Not worth it
If you're looking at this because you're a fan of the other McKinley books, I'd skip it. It has a disturbing rape scene at the beginning & is definetly not for children. Read more
Published on Feb 17 2004 by Michele Slack

5.0 out of 5 stars One of my favorite books
This is one of my favorite stories. It's so well-written that you're kept entertained even at relativly "static" periods, such as Lissar's journey through the woods... Read more
Published on Jan 28 2004 by Sarah Courtney

3.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful, but NOT the fairy tale!
I read this as part of a bundle of retold fairy tales, and was insanely confused. This book bears very, very little resemblence to its parent story, "Donkeyskin," and... Read more
Published on Jan 11 2004 by Kristin Tomic

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful
Although I thought this book did have a rough start, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The writting style is amazing and I for one could not put this book down. Read more
Published on Dec 28 2003

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