Black Thorn, White Rose

With a delightful exception or two, these are not sexually charged versions of traditional tales, despite the book's self-labeling as "adult". Rather, the reinvisioned stories deal with complex decisions, circumstances, and commentary that adults generally assume children lack the context and patience to understand. However, this is much more in line with the historic role of fairy tales: stories of supernatural horror, evil, and unjustice; how a misunderstanding can run away with you; how memories taint over time; the awful sacrifices made in times of need; the cost of pride; Things Going Wrong. It helps to be familiar with the original tales, as many of the reworkings are told from the point of view of the original characters (generally those less than kindly portrayed in the canonical tale) and half the fun is seeing how generations of telephone might have corrupted the "original" history.

With the possible exception of the Midori story, I'd give this to an appropriately precocious preteen.