Entertaining Angels

Cast as a series of modern fairy tales, van der Vyver's witty, innovative debut introduces a heroine devoted to the mythology of her youth. Griet Swart, heartbroken after three miscarriages and a failed marriage, habitually sees the archetypal in the mundane and longs for the unconditional love of a ``prince.'' Living alone in a borrowed flat in Cape Town, South Africa, she deals with her depression through dark humor and calculated flights of fancy-often likening herself to Gretel, for instance, not only because of their similar names but also because of their shared familiarity with ovens; once, contemplating suicide, Griet stuck her head in an unlit gas stove (``I saw not only a cockroach, but this thick layer of crumbs and hard-baked fat.... I spent the rest of the evening cleaning the oven.''). Griet's tragicomic life holds some whimsy, too, as when a gorgeous surfer visits, inspiring one of Griet's sisters to quote, ``Be kind to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it.'' Though launched at a high pitch, the story's considerable energy eventually levels off, with each allegorically imagined chapter, from ``Snow White Takes a Bite of the Apple'' to ``Rapunzel Rescues Herself,'' promising more of the same as Griet learns to be her own savior. Still, through her engagingly quirky approach and sympathetic lead, van der Vyver invests the humdrum of daily life with the spirit of myth and magic. (Jan.)