Red's Untold Tale

Red's Untold Tale
Book
Basic Information
Type of Book:	Novel
Written by:	Wendy Toliver
Publication date:	September 22, 2015
Publication company:	Kingswell Teen
Number of pages:	416

Red's Untold Tale is an official canon companion novel to ABC's Once Upon a Time. It was written by Wendy Toliver, and was released on September 22, 2015.

Official Summary

Red is 16 and lives with Granny in a cottage in the village, where boarding up the house and hiding during wolftime is a means of survival. Red helps Granny with Granny's baked good business, catering as well as door-to-door (in a basket) sales. Red has a constant internal battle between her wild side and her strict, overprotective upbringing, and the issue of "control" as she discovers she has a hot temper when the "mean girls" push her too far. ("When we learn to control it, we needn't fear it", Rumplestiltskin says in the series.) She has flashbacks to her 13th year when she received her cloak and the nickname "Red". She is plagued by nightmares that she doesn't understand, but the Once Upon a Time fans will recognize them as her wolf side coming. Also, the forest creatures that used to accompany her on her deliveries are suddenly afraid of her once she turns 13. She'll be taller and faster than the others at her school, and witty and strong on the outside, though she has a soft side as well. Red balances the difficult times with Granny at home and the girls at school with an emerging and satisfying romance with Peter.

Characters Included

(Listed in order of appearance or first mention)

Regular Characters

• Red Riding Hood
• Anita Lucas (mentioned)
• Granny
• Peter
• Peter's father

New Characters

Vicar Clemmons (mentioned) Seamstress Evans Seamstress Evans' children "Pirate Boy" Violet Roberts Peter's brothers Florence Beatrice Gregory Oliver Farmer Thompson (mentioned) Mrs. Thompson Fernie Thompson Mrs. Roberts Miss Cates Roy

Priscilla Hanks Tucker Williamson Amos Slade Copper Hershel Worthington Priscilla's children Ezekiel Heathcliff Knubbin Gretchen Willie Mayor Benjamin Filbert Florence's mother Timothy Mr. Roberts

Trivia

• Production Notes
• Episode Connections
• Cultural References

Production Notes

• Peter's birthday is given as May 12, and notes that he is 17 (six months older than Red).
• Red's gold cross necklace from the television show is expanded upon and given its own backstory as it is used as a plot device.
• How Red came to be known by her well-known nickname is explained, but her actual real name is never revealed.
• According to the novel, Red Riding Hood is 16 and her birthday is in November.
• In chapter Twelve, Granny tells a story about a castle that sunk underground. According to "Child of the Moon", the Werewolves' Den used to be the grand hall of a castle, until it sunk underground.

Event Chronology

• The Enchanted Forest events take place before "Red-Handed".
• The time span of the novel begins on the morning of Saturday, May 12, shortly before wolfstime starts, and concludes on the evening of Friday, May 18, the last night of wolfstime.

Episode Connections

• Granny suggests she and Red become bandits as a means of earning more money. She further elaborates by saying that bandits plan distractions to loot passing carriages. Snow White, who Red would later befriend, would go on to become an infamous bandit, and use the very same tactic to loot Prince Charming and Princess Abigail's carriage in "Snow Falls".

Disney

• This novel features Amos Slade and Copper from The Fox and The Hound.
• Red compares her cloak to "the feather in that story Granny used to tell to me about the elephant with the big ears". This is a reference to Disney's Dumbo.

Fairytales and Folklore

• This novel features Red Riding Hood and her grandmother from the "Little Red Riding Hood" fairytale and Peter from Peter and the Wolf.
• In Chapter Seven, Red wonders if the magic in her cloak is just a hoax, "like the tale about the emperor who was conned into thinking that he was decked in the finest clothes in the land, only to discover that he’d been parading around completely naked". This is a reference to the fairy tale of "The Emperor's New Clothes".