Tales of Giants from Brazil

These are the old stories Brazil told before the world forgot how to listen. Collected in 1918, when the last storytellers still remembered what giants dreamed, what rivers whispered, and why the Spring Princess chose to rule her kingdom with one foot in the human world and one foot in the sky. At the heart of this collection lies the Moon Giant and the Giantess of the Great River, whose love birthed a daughter destined to become the Spring Princess, ruler of all springs. As she grows beautiful and powerful, suitors come from every corner of mythic Brazil: the Sun Giant with his terrible heat and magnificent offer. But she must choose between duty and desire, between her mother who raised her and the husband who would remake her. These are not gentle tales. There is heartbreak here, and sacrifice, and the particular loneliness of anyone who belongs fully to two worlds. For readers who have ever felt the pull of divided loyalties, or who long for a Brazil that existed before it had a name on any map, these stories still carry water from the old wells.