Aimee Bender

"Contemporary fairy tales, cushioned by goofy humor and a deep tenderness for her characters, that aren't always as dark or as sinister as they initially appear." --The New York Times Book ReviewAimee Bender’s Willful Creatures conjures a fantastical world in which authentic love blooms. This is a place where a boy …

On the eve of her ninth birthday, unassuming Rose Edelstein bites into her mother's homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother’s emotions in the slice. To her horror, she finds that her cheerful mother tastes of despair. Soon, she’s privy to the secret knowledge that …

A traumatic event unfolds when a girl with hair the color of golden wheat appears in an apple orchard; a woman plays out a fantasy with her husband and finds she cannot go back to her old sex life; an ugly woman marries an ogre and struggles to decide if she should stay with him after he mistakenly eats their …