Cartoonist Publishes Modern Day Grimm Fairy Tale

The Last Prince, a modern day fairy tale, charting the life of nine year-old Tatiana and her quest to marry a Prince has just been self-published by our resident cartoonist, Steve Allender.

It’s a dark story of a little girl who relentlessly pursues what she believes is her one hope for a better life.

Steve wrote the original story and drew the illustrations for Henley’s Jeux D’Esprit production in 2016 in aid of the Chiltern Centre.  Formed in 2016, Jeux d’Esprit are a group of local residents who met in connection with various theatre activities, over many years, in Henley to put on a light and sound show at the King’s Arms Barn every year since.  Plans for this year are to take a different form.  More details of this will be published soon.

Steve said, “Jill (Richardson) who heads up Jeux D’Esprit originally asked me to do illustrations for an existing fairy tale for the show.  I didn’t really want to do that as I thought people would compare my illustrations with the classics drawn by legendary artists so I suggested I wrote my own.  I saw Jill in the evening, went to bed, woke up at 2am and by morning had the basic story in my head. It’s been described as a cross between a Roald Dahl and the Brothers Grimm.  All fairy tales have been sanitised over time but we wanted to get back to something that was closer to the originals.   It’s a story about selfish behaviour and the damage which is caused by this.  It’s probably suitable and enjoyable for 9-11 year olds to read.”

Although Steve wrote the original story in 24 hours he has been

The paper book is available to buy from The Bell Bookshop for £7.99 and Steve is planning on publishing an e-book version soon.