Politically Correct Bedtime Stories: A Collection of Modern Tales for Our Life and Times

In this thin book Garner proposes to create ``meaningful literature that is totally free from bias and purged from the influence of its flawed cultural past.'' The results are extremely funny. Updated to account for modern political sensibilities, these revisionist folktales reflect wit and an engaging knack for irony. In ``Little Red Riding Hood,'' Grandma exacts her feminist revenge on the woodchopper, who ``assumes that womyn and wolves can't solve their own problems without a man's help.'' In ``The Frog Prince,'' the princess, now an ``eco-feminist warrior,'' discovers that her dream frog is not a prince, but a real-estate developer. In other tales, Rapunzel becomes a self-reliant coffee-house singer and the Three Little Pigs armed guerrillas, while cultural imperialists such as The Big Bad Wolf and Goldilocks get what has been coming to them for centuries. The author strikes just the right tone here: clever, with more than a touch of self-awareness. And while each of these tales is short and easily digestible, in this case quickly read does not equal quickly forgotten. After one finishes this collection, ``happily ever after'' will never seem quite the same. (Apr.)