Rachel Huffmire’s novels are popular both with children and adults.
From fairy tale novels to local youth theater stages, Menifee author Rachel Huffmire is helping stories come to life, both on the page and in her community.
Since publishing her first novel in 2019, Huffmire has built a career on writing novels that retell fairy tales with fresh plot twists and happily-ever-after endings.
“Everyone loves fairy tales, but at the same time, there are a lot of stories in fairy tales that are from their own time period that maybe don’t reflect the world we live in right now,” Huffmire said. “So, it’s kind of fun to take something that’s near and dear to our hearts and reimagine it.”
Her first novel, “Shattered Snow,” is a historical, time-travel retelling of Margaretha von Waldeck, who is believed to be the inspiration behind the Grimm Brothers’ “Snow White.” This retelling earned her the 2019 Swoony Award for Best Fairy Tale Retelling Romance.
After publishing multiple novels and being named a Whitney Award finalist, Huffmire is now working on a retelling of “The Little Mermaid.”
“A lot of people think they know the fairy tale, but really they only know the retellings, like the Disney-fied version,” she said. “When I go into the history of it, a lot of times fairy tales don’t make a lot of sense. When you get to know the historical context behind it, then it starts to fall into place.”
Huffmire said she researches the historical context of the fairy tale when writing and focuses on stories that challenge tropes and stereotypes from a different time.
The author grew up reading “The Goose Girl” by Shannon Hale and Gail Carson Levine’s “Ella Enchanted,” a retelling of “Cinderella.” Huffmire recently met Levine and had her sign childhood copies of her fairy tale retellings.
“That was such a cool moment, to meet my hero who kind of introduced me to the world of fairy tale retellings,” she said.
While readers know her through novels, Huffmire’s work also reaches audiences behind the scenes in Hollywood. She edits screenplays and rewrites movie and television scripts as a script doctor – an opportunity that she said fell into her lap.
Huffmire also once had dreams of becoming an actress and has used that passion to help bring stories to life on stage by volunteering with the Christian Theater Arts Project, a local nonprofit organization that performs full-scale productions locally, including in Menifee, Murrieta, and Temecula.
“That has been just a wonderful experience,” Huffmire said. “The people there are just very kind and there’s some good storytelling going on over there. It’s really fun to see stories come to life in a live way.”
Huffmire has been a Menifee resident for nearly 10 years, and said the city feels more like home than any place she’s ever lived.
She grew up in a small farming community and has been determined to give her three children a similar experience. This has led her and her family to start a hobby farm on their property, which they call “Fairytale Farm.” The farm includes chickens, and her family has plans of adding goats and planting an orchard this month.
Huffmire and her family have enjoyed living in Menifee, being a part of the community and meeting new people through storytelling.
“Even though writing is a solitary thing and you’re at a desk in front of a computer with your imaginary friends, it also has brought me a lot of real friends,” Huffmire said. “It’s introduced a lot of amazing people into my life.”
