Arabian Nights is a compilation of short stories, most falling into the category of fables. The premise is that a King, after being betrayed by his queen, proceeds to take a different woman into his bed every night, killing her the next morning so that she can’t betray him as well. One princess evades this fate by telling the king a story every night, stopping at the break of dawn, promising to finish the story if the king spares her life. He obviously obliges (giving the book the nickname 1,001 Arabian Nights).
The book is generally fast paced, filled with mythical and fantasy elements. Sometimes the narrative becomes overly complicated because one story is interrupted by another story (told by a character of that story), which is interrupted by another story, etc. I was completely caught off guard by the explicit and distasteful sexual content in several stories.........that would only be permitted in the magazines you find behind the counter at shady gas stations (wink wink).
So I would half heartedly recommend this book because while there are gems in there, you have to dig through some monkey muck to find them.
