I received a copy of this book through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program. While I did enjoy many of the stories in Once Upon a Parsec, I'm afraid this collection falls short when it comes to a captivating hook in each story, which made engagement difficult. I doubt I will remember many of these after moving on to future reads.
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A collection of short stories, science fiction, and fantasy that are supposed to reflect fairytales from alien cultures.

All anthologies are a mixed bag of hit or miss stories, but overall I did enjoy most of them. However, I am not sure I can say it succeeded in its goal as only a couple of the stories felt like fairytales to me.
The three stories that, to me felt the most like fairytales were "The Land of Grunts and Squeaks" by Chris Beckett, "The Ravellers Tale" by Neil Williamson, and "The Tiny Traveler" by Aliya Whiteley.

A story that effected me strongly, perhaps the most out of all of the stories was "The Blood Rose" by Susan Oke. I can't say why fully without giving spoilers so all I will say is, it made me uncomfortable, angry, and unhappy with the ending...and I think those were the reasons it has stayed in my mind long after reading it and the reason it is such a successful story. I kind of regret reading it, but I'm also glad that I did.
Not many stories make me feel this way.

I would recommend this collection for anyone looking for stories that are different from most anthologies, and I am hoping to read more from many of these authors. ( )

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/3339319.html

It's a collection of fairy tales told by non-human cultures, in some of which humans are the villains. Some good stuff here, most memorable being the very first story, "The Little People" by Una McCormack, and my personal favourite, "The Land of Grunts and Squeaks", by Chris Beckett, in which a formerly telepathic race loses that power and has to learn to communicate with sounds. ( )

This science fiction anthology has a fairy tale theme: some of the stories are in the form of fairy tales, others are about the telling of tales. Some are both! The title uses the word "alien" but sometimes it means humans on alien planets-- though many others are alien creatures on alien worlds with no acknowledged connections to humanity at all. Like any anthology outside of a really good "best of," the stories are hit and miss; I found the ones that just were fairy tales (but for alien cultures) to be on the weaker side, often too weird and inscrutable-- or too straightforward. The ones more about the telling of tales were usually better, in my opinion, going beyond the frame to say something about why we tell fairy tales.

Along those lines, it's probably bad for the book that one of its best stories is its first, "The Little People" by Una McCormack. It's about human settlers on a distant world, alternating between a second-person narrative about the child of settlers telling themselves the story of colonization and the third-person narrative of the actual colonization. Like all sf, it reflects back on our own world... in this case, quite damningly... but it is (as always for Una) beautifully told. I also liked Liz Williams's "Starfish," which takes as its subject the difficulty of doing something like translating a story from an alien culture to a human one.

That said, Chris Beckett's "The Land of Grunts and Squeaks" was a very good example of what you can do with a "straight" alien fairy tale. It's a tale from the culture of insect species that's in telepathic communion, and it's about a curse: the curse of having that taken away! "Children were left alone with fears which no one else could see. Lovers could no longer feel each other's love. A woman would look at her life's companion and think, 'I'm sorry about those angry feelings I had earlier on. I truly love you with all my heart', but her friend would have no idea she'd had that thought. Tender caresses lost their meaning, becoming no more than one skin touching another." Imagine such a terrible world! It works because it communicates an alien value system and sensibility at the same time it tells a pretty simple story; the weaker examples just tell a system but don't communicate a worldview. Other good stories of this type included "The Tale of Suyenye the Wise, the Ay, and the People of the Shining Land" by Gaie Sebold and "Pale Sister" by Jaine Fenn. There were, perhaps, a few too many like these, though, and after a while, the book got a little monotonous. I want to say that the best stories were up front, but maybe it's just that I got used to most of the themes contained within.

This is an excellent anthology of Science Fiction based fairy tales. Some were better than others, but the majority were stellar and really draw the reader into the story. Neil Williamson's "The Raveller's Tale" is probably one of my most favorites. Highly recommended. ( )