Cinderella a personalised book with your child as the hero

Once upon a time there was a kind and gentle girl who lived with her stepmother and her two stepsisters in a tall house at the edge of town. From first light until long after dark she scrubbed and swept and carried and fetched, and whenever she sat down to rest, somebody called for one more thing.

"Fetch my shawl!" called the elder stepsister.

"Mend my ribbon!" called the younger.

"And when you have done that," said the stepmother, "the pots are waiting."

At night, when the work was done, the girl curled up by the kitchen hearth to keep warm, and in the morning she was always dusted grey with cinders. So her stepsisters called her Cinderella, and before long nobody in the house remembered that she had ever had another name.

One morning there came a knock at the door. A footman in palace livery stood on the step, holding out a card edged with gold.

"By order of the King," he announced, "every young lady in the kingdom is invited to the royal ball tonight, so that the Prince may meet them all."

The two stepsisters snatched the invitation and shrieked with delight. Cinderella stood at the end of the hallway with her broom in her hand.

"May I go too?" she asked quietly.

The stepsisters laughed so hard they had to hold on to each other. "You? To the palace? In that apron?"

"Somebody has to stay and see to the house," said the stepmother, and that was the end of it.

All day long Cinderella helped them get ready. Then, as the sun went down, she watched from the kitchen window as the carriage rolled away down the road towards the lights of the palace. When it had gone, she sat down by the cold hearth with the broom and the scrubbing pail, and a tear ran down her cheek and made a clean line through the cinders.

"Now then," said a soft voice behind her. "What is all this?"

Cinderella turned round. In the moonlit kitchen garden, just outside the open door, stood a little woman in a cloak that glittered like frost, with a slender wand in her hand.

"I am your fairy godmother," said the little woman, "and I have been watching you for a long time. You are kind when nobody thanks you and patient when nobody notices. Would you like to go to the ball?"

"Oh, yes," whispered Cinderella. "More than anything."

"Then fetch me the biggest pumpkin in the garden."

Cinderella ran and fetched it. The fairy godmother tapped it once with her wand, and in a swirl of golden sparks the pumpkin swelled and rounded and shone until it was a golden carriage with velvet seats inside. Six little mice from the pantry became six white horses, a fat grey rat became a coachman with splendid whiskers, and two lizards became two footmen in green and gold.

"But I can't go like this," said Cinderella, looking down at her patched grey dress.

The fairy godmother smiled. She touched the hem of the dress with her wand and drew a line of light from the hem right up to the shoulder, and as the light passed, the patches and the cinders melted away. Cinderella was wearing a ball gown of silver-blue silk, soft as moonlight, and on her feet were two little slippers made of glass that sparkled with every step.

"Now listen carefully," said the fairy godmother. "The magic lasts only until midnight. When the clock strikes twelve, the carriage will be a pumpkin again and your gown will be your old dress. You must be home before the last chime."

"I promise," said Cinderella.

Away went the golden carriage through the night, and the lights of the palace grew bigger and brighter ahead. When Cinderella stepped into the great ballroom, the music faltered and every head in the room turned. Nobody knew who she was, not even her own stepsisters.

The Prince crossed the room at once and bowed. "Will you dance with me?" he asked.

They danced the first dance, and the next, and the one after that. They laughed and talked, and Cinderella was so happy that she never once thought about the time.

Then, high above the ballroom, the great clock began to strike.

One. Two. Three.

"Midnight!" gasped Cinderella. "I have to go!"

She slipped from the Prince's hands and ran across the ballroom, out through the doors and down the wide palace steps, while the clock went on striking behind her. Halfway down, one glass slipper came off her foot, but there was no time to go back for it. As the last chime fell, she ran out through the palace gates.

And there she stood in the dark, in her patched grey dress, with a pumpkin at her feet and six mice and a rat and two lizards scurrying off into the hedge. All that was left of the night was one glass slipper, still on her foot.

The Prince ran down the steps after her, but all he found was the other slipper, shining on the stone.

The next morning, trumpets sounded in the street. The Prince had sworn that he would find the girl whose foot fitted the glass slipper, and he went himself, carrying it from door to door down every street in the kingdom. Every young lady tried it on, but not one foot fitted.

At last he came to the tall house at the edge of town. The elder stepsister pushed and squeezed, but her toes would not go in. The younger stepsister huffed and wriggled, but her heel would not go in.

"Is there nobody else in this house?" asked the Prince.

"Only the girl who does the cinders," said the stepmother. "She wasn't at the ball."

"Everyone may try," said the Prince.

So Cinderella came out of the kitchen, sat down on a stool and slid her foot into the glass slipper. It fitted exactly, as it always had. Then she took the other slipper from her apron pocket and put that on too.

The Prince knew her at once, cinders and all. "It's you," he said, and he smiled the same smile as the night before.

Cinderella went back to the palace that very day, side by side with the Prince, and the whole kingdom came out to welcome her. She wore a fine dress for the occasion, but everybody could see that underneath she was exactly the same kind and gentle girl. And because she was so kind, she forgave her stepsisters, and they were never unkind to anyone again.