Standalone Novels
| Title | Published | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|
| Girls Made of Snow and Glass | 2017 | Buy |
| Girl, Serpent, Thorn | 2020 | Buy |
Melissa Bashardoust writes fantasy novels that retell and remix classic fairy tales. She studied English at the University of California, Berkeley, where she developed her interest in children’s literature and fairy tale retellings. She lives in Southern California.
Her debut, Girls Made of Snow and Glass (2017), reimagines the Snow White story through two alternating perspectives: a young queen with a heart of glass and a girl created from snow. Critics compared it to a blend of Snow White and Frozen filtered through the dark, sensual style of Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber. Her second novel, Girl, Serpent, Thorn (2020), draws on Persian mythology to tell the story of a princess whose touch is poisonous and who must navigate a kingdom full of secrets and hidden agendas.
Both of Bashardoust’s novels feature complex female protagonists and explore questions of identity, power, and what it means to be human or monstrous. Her work stands out in the crowded field of YA fairy tale retellings for its willingness to reach beyond Western European source material.