Shadow Spinner

Shadow Spinner is a historical fiction novel for children and young adults written by American author Susan Fletcher and published in 1998. The story follows thirteen-year old Marjan, a servant and storyteller, as she struggles to find new stories to help keep her heroine, Shahrazad, alive. Set in ancient Persia, Shadow Spinner is a reimagining of the classic 1001 Arabian Nights.

In Majran’s story, Fletcher incorporates themes of courage, forgiveness, loyalty, and the power of words. Marjan learns the “truth below the surface of tales” and the unique ability of stories to teach people how to live their lives.

Marjan is the first-person narrator of Shadow Spinner, and she begins each chapter of her tale with a bit of advice called “Lessons for Life and Storytelling,” which informs the section to come. Marjan lives with an older Jewish couple, Auntie Chava and Uncle Eli, who took her in as a servant after the death of her mother. Auntie Chava and Uncle Eli treat Marjan more as a daughter, and Marjan is happy with them.



Marjan knows lots of stories from both her mother and from listening to storytellers at the local bazaar. Auntie Chava worries that Marjan’s “shadow spinning,” or storytelling, is impractical, but Marjan disagrees. She knows that stories can save your life: just look at the example of Shahrazad.

Shahrazad is the Sultan’s current wife. When the Sultan’s first wife betrayed him and took a lover, he had them both killed. Ever since then, he believes that all women are betrayers. He marries a new woman each night and kills her the next morning. This continues until Shahrazad, the daughter of the Sultan’s vizier, volunteers to be the Sultan’s next wife. On the night they marry, she asks him if she could tell one last story to her younger sister before dawn. The Sultan agrees, and Shahrazad tells her sister Dunyazad an exciting tale, stopping at a thrilling point as dawn arrives. The Sultan allows her to live another day so that he can hear the rest of the story. This continues for two-and-a-half years.

Marjan admires Shahrazad’s skill and bravery. By telling the Sultan her stories, she is both protecting her own life and saving hundreds of girls from being killed. The Sultan’s murderous ways have had a deleterious effect on the community. A famous outlaw, Abu Muslem, is legendary for helping women escape out of the city to safety. Marjan’s own mother, Madar, deliberately maimed Marjan’s foot so that she would not be taken as one of the Sultan’s wives. Madar then killed herself. Marjan is angry at her mother for crippling her. Marjan now walks with a limp and knows that her foot is an “ill omen” to many people, and that she will probably never marry because of it.



One day, Auntie Chava takes Marjan with her to sell jewelry and finery to the women of the Sultan’s harem. While the women look at the goods, Marjan entertains the younger children by telling them stories. Dunyazad overhears Marjan and takes her to meet Shahrazad. Marjan finds her heroine surrounded by books and scrolls, desperate to find the next story to entertain the Sultan. It has been 989 nights, and Shahrazad is running out of tales. Despite her situation, Shahrazad truly loves the Sultan. Marjan tells Shahrazad part of a story about a mermaid named Julnar that Shahrazad has never heard before. Marjan agrees to help her idol and joins the harem as Shahrazad’s personal servant.

Marjan leaves Uncle Eli and Auntie Chava’s poor but loving home and enters into the opulence and intrigue of the harem. There she meets the other girls as well as the Sultan’s obese, murderous, and over-protective mother, the Khatun. The Khatun hates Shahrazad and all those who help her. Like her son, she believes that women are deceivers. The Khatun has another girl, Soraya, ready next in line to become queen when Shahrazad inevitably fails.

Shahrazad tells the Sultan the story Marjan shared with her about the mermaid Julnar and her son, Badar Basim. The Sultan remembers the story as one he heard as a child and is excited to hear the rest. Marjan, however, doesn’t know how the story ends.



Marjan must escape the harem and find the blind storyteller who told her the story originally. Shahrazad is fearful, knowing that “no one can get out” of the harem. Marjan manages to sneak away, hidden in a chest that Shahrazad sends out for repairs. Marjan meets Ayaz, a boy who helps her find the blind storyteller. Marjan observes that he is no longer blind, and he is really the famed Abu Muslem. Marjan must return multiple times to hear the entire story. Aided by the harem’s pigeon-keeper, Zaynab, Marjan is able to send messages to the storyteller. Marjan continues to help Shahrazad, despite being beaten and imprisoned by the Khatun.

Marjan leaves the harem but returns to aid Shahrazad, surrendering herself to tell the Sultan one last story. Couched in the tale of a mermaid and merman king, Marjan lets the Sultan know that Shahrazad forgives him for his crimes and truly loves him. She urges the Sultan to also forgive and be happy. Marjan herself learns to forgive her mother for ruining her foot. At the story’s end, Marjan must leave the city and her friends behind, but knows that “what seems like an ending is really a beginning in disguise.”