A little over a month ago we got some new shelves and uncrated a bunch of books that had been languishing in moving boxes. These were Ikea BESTÅ shelves so the books were going in 3 deep. With this in mind it was especially important to set aside for front row shelving books that you might want to see again anytime in the foreseeable future. I tried to set aside books in series I wanted to finish and old favourites I might want to read to the kids.

I love retold fairy tales. They’re like my literary equivalent of comfort food. Of course, the story of Hua Mulan is not a fairy tale (there are no fairies or other supernatural elements) but a folk tale. Still for the purposes of this discussion we’ll lump folk tales along with fairy tales, legends and myths.

Every girl, not just those of Chinese heritage, should love Hua Mulan. She’s the ultimate girl power figure, saving not only her family but the whole country, by being brave, skilled and simply better than any boy. To share the story with my anglophone kids, I need an English source (I get by with Mandarin movies, but alas I read Chinese slowly and painfully with a dictionary in my hand).