Cinderella Read online

  retold by

  Sarah L. Thomson

  illustrated by

  Nicoletta Ceccoli

  To the lovely Dalila

  –N.C.

  Text copyright © 2012 by Marshall Cavendish Corporation

  Illustrations copyright © 2012 by Nicoletta Ceccoli

  All rights reserved

  Amazon Publishing

  Attn: Amazon Children’s Books

  P.O. Box 400818

  Las Vegas, NV 89149

  www.amazon.com/amazonchildrenspublishing

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Thomson, Sarah L.

  Cinderella / retold by Sarah L. Thomson ; illustrated by Nicoletta Ceccoli ;

  based on the story by Charles Perrault. – 1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Although mistreated by her stepmother and stepsisters, Cinderella

  meets her prince with the help of her fairy godmother.

  ISBN 978-0-7614-6170-8 (hardcover) – ISBN 978-0-7614-6171-5 (ebook)

  [1. Fairy tales. 2. Folklore–France.] I. Ceccoli, Nicoletta, ill. II.

  Perrault, Charles, 1628-1703. Cendrillon. III. Title.

  PZ8.T38Ci 2012

  [Fic]–dc23

  2011034873

  The illustrations are rendered in acrylics on paper and digitally.

  Book design by Anahid Hamparian

  Editor: Robin Benjamin

  First edition

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Author’s Note

  THIS STORY OF CINDERELLA is based on the version collected

  and published by the French author Charles Perrault, who was born

  in the seventeenth century. Perrault’s Cinderella echoes the elegance

  and luxury of the French court of King Louis XIV, and it’s from his

  version that we get Cinderella’s famous glass slippers.

  Perrault’s story does not have the darker ending some readers may

  remember from another famous version, collected by the Brothers

  Grimm, in which Cinderella’s stepsisters are punished for their cruel

  treatment of Cinderella. My retelling stays close to Perrault’s version,

  but it does add one detail that is closer to the Grimm story–the

  stepsisters’ feet are too sore from being forced into the slipper for the

  stepsisters to dance at the ball. I thought they deserved just a little bit

  of punishment for being so terrible to poor Cinderella!

  Perrault considered the moral of the story to be that beauty is a

  rare treasure, but kindness and courtesy are priceless. Without them,

  nothing is possible; with them, you can do anything.

  And there is another moral: Intelligence, courage, and common

  sense are also handy, but if all else fails, it helps to have the blessing of

  a loving godmother! –S.L.T.

  Once upon a time,

  a rich merchant lived with his daughter. He loved the girl for her beautiful face and her sweet heart. But after his wife died, he decided to marry a second time, and his new wife was selfish and cruel. She had two daughters of her own who were just like her.

  The stepmother forced her stepdaughter to wash the pots and pans, scrub the floors, and tend the fire.

  The poor girl did not even have a bed of her own, but lay

  by the hearth every night and rose in the morning covered with

  cinders. And so her stepsisters called her “Cinderella.”

  One day the king sent word that he would hold a grand ball.

  There, the prince would choose a wife.

  “I shall wear my red velvet with the lace!” declared the older

  stepsister.

  “I’ll wear my satin with the golden flowers!” said the younger

  one.

  Cinderella gathered up her courage to ask a question.

  “Can’t I–,” she said.

  “Hand me my stockings,” said the older stepsister.

  “May I–,” said Cinderella.

  “Tie this ribbon in my hair,” said the younger stepsister.

  “Please, can I go to the ball?” asked Cinderella.

  “Certainly not!” said her stepmother. And the stepmother

  and stepsisters swept off in their carriage to the castle, leaving

  Cinderella alone.

  Cinderella sat by the fire. A gentle voice asked, “Why are you

  crying?”

  Cinderella jumped up. There in the kitchen stood a woman

  with the kindest face she had ever seen.

  “Don’t worry, my dear,” the woman said. “I am your fairy

  godmother, and I will send you to the ball!”

  “But, Godmother,” said Cinderella, “I have no carriage or

  horses or even a gown to wear!”

  “Never fear,” said her godmother. “And bring me a pumpkin

  from the garden.”

  Bewildered, Cinderella picked a plump orange pumpkin.

  The godmother touched the pumpkin with the magic

  of her wand . . .

  . . . and it turned into an elegant coach. The magic turned

  six mice into six prancing horses, two lizards into two proud

  footmen, and a rat into a plump coachman.

  When the wand brushed Cinderella’s rags, she was dressed in

  pale blue velvet and silver satin. On her feet were a pair of glass

  slippers, delicate as icicles.

  “You are dressed like a queen!” said her godmother. “Behave

  like one as well. Be kind and courteous to all you meet. And leave

  the ball before midnight, or everything that my spells have created

  will vanish.”

  Cinderella promised to come home by midnight and rode

  off to the ball.

  When Cinderella walked into the ballroom, the fiddlers

  paused on their strings. The dancers craned their necks to

  see her. The prince bowed low and asked her to dance.

  Whispers raced through the crowd.

  “She must be a princess from some foreign land.”

  “How gracefully she dances!”

  “What a sweet smile!”

  “Why, the prince can’t keep his eyes off her!”

  But Cinderella remembered her godmother’s words.

  Before midnight, she curtsied to the prince and hurried

  out the door.

  Just as Cinderella’s coach rolled up in front of her

  house, the church clock struck twelve times. Cinderella

  found herself in rags once more, sitting on a pumpkin,

  with mice and lizards and a big rat at her feet.

  The next night, the king held another ball.

  Cinderella’s godmother sent her in a gown of

  white silk sparkling with diamonds and the same

  glass slippers. The prince danced with no one else.

  “But please,” he begged, “won’t you tell me

  your name?”

  Cinderella hesitated. And the clock struck the first

  stroke of midnight.

  Cinderella slipped from the prince’s arms and ran toward

  the door.

  “Wait!” he cried, running after her. But when he looked

  outside, the beautiful princess was nowhere to be found. He

  could see nothing but a shabby little servant girl with a pumpkin

  in her arms.

  On the steps was one of the glass slippers.

  When Cinderella’s stepsisters arrived home, they were full of

  stories about the mysterious princess.

  “The prince swears he’ll bring
that slipper to every home in the

  kingdom!” exclaimed the younger stepsister. “And he’ll marry the

  woman whose foot fits into it!”

  “Well,” said the elder one, “that woman will be me!”

  “No,” said the younger, “me!”

  The next day the prince arrived. A servant followed him,

  carrying the glass slipper.

  The elder stepsister sat on a stool. She shoved and pushed until

  she cried. But she could not get her foot into the shoe.

  The younger stepsister tried next. She wiggled and twisted until

  she sobbed. But her foot would not fit either.

  Then the prince heard a quiet voice asking, “May I try, too?”

  “Get back to your kitchen!” cried the stepmother.

  But the prince remembered Cinderella’s voice and her

  gentle eyes and her sweet smile. He knelt and slipped the

  shoe on Cinderella’s foot. He was not surprised when she

  drew the matching slipper from her pocket and placed it

  on her other foot.

  “You are the princess I danced

  with!” he said. “I knew it the

  minute I saw you!”

  Cinderella and the prince were married as soon as the wedding

  feast could be prepared. And Cinderella, who was as good as she

  was beautiful, invited her stepsisters and her stepmother to the

  wedding. Her stepmother was too out of sorts to dance, and as for

  the stepsisters, their feet were too sore from trying on the slipper.

  It was weeks before they had recovered enough to dance even a jig.

  But Cinderella and her prince lived happily ever after.

 

 

  Sarah L Thomson, Cinderella

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