Robin McKinley's Spindle's End is an antecedent of mythic and mythologized literature. Thematically, this means that mythic elements—the sword, the spindle, the kiss; birth and death; good versus evil—the tex tual qualities that Joseph Campbell describes as symbolic of the play of eternity in time and Jane Yolen terms "the larger dreams of humankind, a patchwork of all the smaller dreams stitched together by time" are available in Spindle's End.

Peony is classic princess material. What's more, Rosie and Peony have already been so much a part of each other's lives as to leave deep and lasting impressions; they share habits and gestures. It is believed (by Sigil, Ikor, Aunt and Katriona) that Rosie and Peony's friendship is a kind of magic that will prove useful when they combine arts to save the princess and to thwart Pernicia. So they...