Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall

Snow White travels through Arabia as an Ambassador from the exiled Fables community. The local sultan captures her. He intends to marry her and then kill her.

Snow White answers by taking on the role of Scheherazade. She tells the sultan one fantastic story after another, and the telling stretches across 1,001 nights, each tale buying her more time.

The stories themselves reveal secret histories of familiar Fables characters. They range from horror to dark intrigue to a mercurial coming-of-age, so the tone shifts from one tale to the next.

The volume is a graphic novel written by Bill Willingham, with sequences drawn by a changing roster of artists. Among them are Charles Vess, Brian Bolland and John Bolton, as well as Michael Wm. Kaluta and James Jean. Mark Buckingham and Jill Thompson contribute too. Each tale looks different from the last.

It is set in the early days of Fabletown, long before the main Fables series begins, and it works as an entry point for new readers. Whether Snow White's storytelling can outlast the sultan's patience is what holds the frame together.