Mademosielle Sophie of Storytelling

Sophie started out as a normal girl. Her parents owned a small orchard close to the castle and in the evenings when they huddled close to the fire they learned now to count, how to read and how to write. During the day they planted, weeded, picked and watered in the orchard, along with bringing water for the house and feeding the two chickens and one goat they owned. Sophia was the second oldest of four children and babysat the two younger ones till they were five and old enough to help.
At thirteen her parents started to send her into the royal city to learn the harp from her elderly grandmother who had worked her way up to being the music tutor of the young princess. She quite enjoyed spending time with her grandmother and she had a good ear for music, but she longed for more. Instead of making music, she longed to have a good education where she could be a tutor herself. But not of music or dancing or art, but of penmanship and reading. Something, at the time, that only men did.
Her young majesty who studied under her grandmother was small for her age, with delicate hands and lovely hair and she often helped teach Sophie. She was far from inheriting the throne and enjoyed music as well as teaching it. She loved the sound of a song when someone played it, but then got better and better until the composer himself could not even perfect it more. With all her free time, she encouraged Sophie to love the harp, play it and perfect everything she did with it.
“Respect it.” She’d say. “And it will work with you. Not for you, but it will do as you ask.”
“You don’t ask it to do anything. You play it.” Sophie would say back as firmly as an unmovable ox.
Thus the grandmother would intervene or the princess would be called for a meal or another lesson of some kind. When the lessons were done she would spend the night, for these lessons only took place in the evening, when no work was to be done at home. During the darker hours when meals had been eaten and music learned, she told her grandmother stories.
“Once upon a time,” She’d start and go into a wonderful tale about a magical forest or a ship at sea or whatever story flew into her head at that very moment. “There lived a lovely old woman with a very young spirit. She taught all of her grandchildren to love music and so they did. Her only grandson grew to love composing, as he hated playing an actual instrument, but knew all their notes. Her first granddaughter learned the piano and played it with such ease that some people swore she was the goddess of music herself. Her second granddaughter was taught how to play the harp and though she despised the great amount of work, she played it well. Her third and last granddaughter took up the love of song. Opera poured from her throat as wine pours from its bottle, elegant and smooth. And so when the grandmother died, each grandchild performed their talent over her grave while planting a flower’s seed. Their talent was of such incredible ability that the seeds immediately grew into flowers and the grandmother sat up to listen one last time. The grandchildren knew that music sustained them and that was enough to make them live happily ever after. The day they died not a soul grieved for they knew now they would entertain their heavenly father forevermore-with their wonderful teacher and loving grandmother there as well.”
“Wonderful dearie. Wonderful.”
And after such a story each would retire for the night. In the morning she would leave and return to the orchard for work. So in the evening she would travel back into the city for a lesson and to share a story.

Very nice, Luv. I think it can be hard to write about fairytale's of sorts and make them seem a little more mature, but you did. I personally have tried to write a fairytale, and it didn't turn out so great. I have some advice for you nonetheless.
1. Try to appeal to your audience. Most of us are middle/high school students' and we all have read the classic fairytales when we were little. Now that we are older, we still want to believe that we'll meet our prince (or princess), fall in love, and live happily ever after. Our only problem is that we know the world doesn't exactly work that way, so a fairytale that is a little darker, with hardships and a believable ending, might be better.
2. You seemed to switch gears a little with your story. I think it might have been a little better if you had written it from Sophie's persepctive, not a fly-on-the-wall. I understand that maybe you wanted to to add something as a narrarator, but you must also think of how your story is coming across.
3. You seemed to hop around between the princess and Sophie. I know that you wanted both sides told, but you should try to stick with one main character of sorts, and add something about one of them later. The title is about Sophie, so I recommend that you pick her as your main character, it just makes sense.
I hope I don't seem to harsh or judgemental. You're a great writer!
-Rachelle41

Thanks. I'm not too good at narrorating, but if you read Storyteller by Edward (or Edmund, I forgot) Myers, its really cool. Between chapters and stuff, he adds in himself and the reader. Questions that we might be thinking are written on the page and then he answers them as if he were right beside you. I wanted to give that a try, but maybe I will just change it to Sophie's view. And I didn't think I was blowing up the princess to much. I just think she's gonna be important later. Maybe. Thanks anyways.
Love,
Luv