ldquo;You can tell the same story over and over a hundred different ways, and every version is a little right and every version is a little wrong." Five women begrudgingly meet for five weeks of group therapy in New York City. Bernice dated a mysterious tech billionaire who turned out to be a serial killer. Ruby was saved from a wolf's stomach as a child and now wears its coat. Ashlee won an eligible bachelor's heart in a reality-TV show. Gretel was once lost and later found deep in the city with her older brother, and now doubts her own experiences. Raina is a beautiful housewife hiding a terrible secret. Group facilitator Will believes he can help these women heal by listening to their stories. In this modern retelling of classic fairy tales, Adelmann (Girls of a Certain Age, 2021) shatters "happily ever after," showing how the women's lives are haunted in the aftermath of their disturbing experiences, and brilliantly brings to light the historical exploitation and manipulation of female trauma in the media. With the current fascination with true crime and reality television, this powerful first novel holds up a mirror to the reader and challenges our perceptions of truth.

Adelmann's funny and poignant debut novel (after the collection Girls of a Certain Age) invokes classic and modern fairy tales to portray a group of traumatized women. Six women, all public figures, join a mysterious group therapy experiment facilitated by the handsome if preternaturally bland Will. Every Friday evening, they meet in a YMCA rec room to drink coffee and share their experiences. First up is Bernice, who was whisked into a whirlwind romance with a tech billionaire nicknamed "Bluebeard" for his blue-dyed beard. Everything was great until Bernice discovered his secret habit of imprisoning and murdering women in his mansion. Then there's Ashlee, a "survivor" of a Bachelor-esque dating show; and Ruby, who as a child was swallowed by a wolf. Adelmann's retelling of "Rumpelstiltskin" is particularly good; it involves Raina, the oldest of the group, and includes a stunning revelation during one of Will's sessions of an imp-human sex scene. In the background is a running commentary about the power structure of narratives ("Morals create a labyrinth of rules geared toward blaming the victim," says Bernice, quoting a woman who later became one of Bluebeard's victims). Revisionist fairy tales are nothing new, but Adelmann's are elevated by accomplished prose and wry humor. It's a fresh and inventive gem. Agent: Jenni Ferrari-Adler, Union Literary. (May)

Adelmann (Girls of a Certain Age) has rewritten classic fairy-tale heroines, and villains, in modern light. The story is dark and twisted and funny. A group of women, all survivors of trauma, meet in a Manhattan group therapy. Bernice, Gretel, Ruby, and Raina were each searching for their own fairy-tale ending, but instead found horrors and broken promises. As the women hear one another's tales, they realize they may have more in common than they first thought. Why were they all brought together? Is it really for group therapy or something sinister? And are they capable of rescuing one another? Readers will enjoy piecing together not only each woman's story, but also using clues to connect the modern women to their more classical portrayals. Adelmann, while sticking to the classic stories, also brings in modern issues that add a new level of danger and subtle discomfort that most readers will feel. Lauren Ezzo brings the women to life, highlighting both their fierceness and their frailty. VERDICT Fans of retold fairy tales will enjoy this latest addition to the genre.--Elyssa Everling

Familiar fairy tales retold through the modern lenses of group-therapy sessions and reality TV. Bernice has just entered the news cycle, the only survivor of a flamboyant tech billionaire/serial murderer who was known for his eccentric obsession with the color blue, which included dyeing his goatee a signature shade of cyan. Gretel's iconic photo spread--an image of her and her brother, Hans, reunited with their father in the hospital after having been held captive in a house made of candy--is a part of American true-crime legend; as is the hard-to-fathom assault on Ruby and the shabby wolf-skin coat she's made out of its perpetrator. Raina, the oldest of the group at almost 40, is familiar mostly for her famous husband, though her face is vaguely reminiscent of some decades-old scandal surrounding their romance, while Ashlee, the most recent winner of the reality dating show The One, seems to be living out her happy ending in real time. All five women have received the same spamlike email inviting them to work through the lingering trauma of their "unusual stor[ies]" in group therapy led by the genially handsome Will, who exhorts them to Absolute Honesty, ostensibly in order to heal. As the summer passes, the women transcend their initial rivalries and suspicions and become bonded by their unique suffering. It seems Will's therapeutic dictates are beginning to work, but as the women move past their public victimization and into the identities they would like to build in the aftermath, it becomes clear that Will has one more surprise up his impeccable sleeve. Adelmann travels the well-worn paths of some of the most famous fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm with stylistic panache and 21st-century verve. However, it's her nuanced consideration of our own culpability that makes this book unique. In the end, Adelmann's true subject is actually her audience, the great anonymous we who consumes the horrors of violent husbands, ravaging wolves, hungry witches, and made-for-TV love stories with such compulsive demand we never pause to think what might come after the happy ending. Both a meditation on trauma and a sendup of our society's obsession with scripted reality, this book sings. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.