Whatever After Books In Order

Publication Order of Whatever After Books

Publication Order of Whatever After Special Edition Books

Whatever After is a series of children’s books written by Sarah Mlynowski. The books are Fairy Tales with a unique twist. Sarah wrote the Whatever After series with the intention of injecting an empowering element for girls into the fairy tales landscape.

+The Story

The Whatever After books tell the story of Abby and Jonah, two siblings who do not expect much out of their new home; that is until they come across a magic mirror in their basement.

When Jonah knocks the mirror over, the resulting damage is the least of their worries. The mirror sweeps the siblings into the story of Snow White. Once they get over their wonder and awe, Abby and Jonah quickly rush to the aid of Snow White, saving her from the poisoned apple.

Abby and Jonah initially think they are heroes. But then they realize their folly. If Snow White never falls unconscious, then her prince never finds her. Abby and Jonah didn’t save Snow White. They ruined her happy ending.

The siblings realize that they might not be the heroes they imagined. But they are not too keen on giving up. They make it their goal to play matchmaker and get Snow White and her prince together no matter what it takes.

When Abby and Jonah finally get back to the real world, they realize that they just took their first adventure of many. Each new book in the Whatever After series finds Abby and Jonah disappearing into their magic mirror to travel into a new fairy tale.

There the siblings cannot help but mess things up. Their best intentions always end with the prince and princess either never meeting or not liking each other quite as much as they should. As such, Abby and Jonah are forced to take steps to put things back on the right track.

It takes a lot of creative thinking on the part of the siblings to revert the various fairy tales to their original state.

Sarah, the author, has loved fairy tales since she was a child. When she wasn’t reading them, she was telling her own fairy tales which her mother wrote down. As an adult, Sarah was driven to write Whatever After because a closer look at the fairy tales of old left her dissatisfied.

Sarah Mlynowski found that whenever she read her daughter a fairy tale, she felt the need to make changes to the endings. She didn’t like the manner in which the female characters acted and the decisions they made to get their happy endings.

The idea that Cinderella had to get married to escape the torment of her stepmother’s home did nothing to inspire Sarah and she certainly didn’t want her daughter to take any lessons from such stories.

And in the process of taking creative license with the stories she was telling her daughter, Sarah realized that she could do the same thing for every other little girl in the world.

Sarah didn’t just want to change popular fairy tales, though. She wanted to add girl power to them. And that is what the Whatever After series does. It has plenty of strong female character making strong decisions and taking charge of their own lives.

Scholastic didn’t know the Whatever After books would become such a big hit when they brought Sarah on board. The myriads of copies her books have sold since prove that they made the wise decision.

The author’s editor was impressed by Sarah’s ability to tweak classic fairytales. She was impressed that the author always paid homage to the original stories, maintaining the overall spirit whilst also adding a subversive aspect.

Sarah’s goal is to make fairy tales empowering for young girls. She doesn’t get overly preachy. And Sarah makes sure that her books her entertaining. She understands that there is no point trying to pass important messages on to her female readers when they aren’t having fun in the process.

The Whatever After series has been a massive success, with the books being translated into over two dozen languages and finding a footing in unexpected foreign markets. While Scholastic does a lot of work to push these books, Sarah Mlynowski also makes an effort to use her connections and her social network to promote them.

Sarah didn’t expect to write more than four of the Whatever After books. But once she started, she knew there would be no stopping.

+The Author

Sarah Mlynowski was born in 1977. A native of Montreal in Quebec, Sarah’s mother is Elissa Ambrose, a writer of romance novels. It comes as no surprise that Sarah followed in her mother’s footsteps, though the author has a preference for books targeted towards middle-grade audiences.

Sarah was a student at McGill University where she got her English Literature Degree. Sarah worked in publishing for a while before writing her first book. By the time she left Canada for New York, Sarah had become a full-time writer.

Most people know the author because of the Whatever After books.

Sarah has a husband and two daughters. The author has produced children’s fiction, adult fiction, and nonfiction.

+Fairest of All

Abby thought she and her brother Jonah were pretty normal kids, or as normal as they could get. And then the mirror changed everything. They found it in their basement. And they do not know how but it ate them up and spat them out in the same land as Snow White, the character from the fairytale.

Abby and Jonah are both awed and a little afraid when they realize they just walked into a fairytale. And they waste no time in ruining things by saving Snow White from her poisoned apple.

Of course, the siblings think they are heroes. It takes them a while to realize that, because of them, Snow White will never meet her prince. After all, he only met her because she fell unconscious.

Or at least that is what the stories say. Because Abby and Jonah ruined Snow White’s happy ending, they make it their goal to fix things.

+If the Shoe Fits

When Abby and Jonah go into the mirror, they are determined to not ruin things this time. The mirror took them to Cinderella’s story, and there’s no way they will interfere.

When Cinderella breaks her foot, Abby and Jonah know that the glass slipper from the prince will never fit, not when the foot is so swollen, and the siblings know it’s their fault. Abby and Jonah must save the day again.

2 Responses to “Whatever After”

1. Jordan Gravermandates: 3 years ago

   I have all the books waiting on book 15 (just dance)
   I have been collecting since kindergarten!!! I get these as Christmas and birthday gifts. I was reading them all out of order but not anymore… I restarted from 1 and I am currently on book 5 ( i kind of slacked off for while lol)

   Reply
2. Nuha: 4 years ago

   I am on book 6 Cold as ice 🧊 Chapter 9

   Reply