High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories, published in October 2006, is a collection of eight short stories by Susanna Clarke and illustrated by Charles Vess. The stories, which are sophisticated fairy tales, focus on the power of women; some are set in the same alternate history as Clarke`s debut novel Jonathan Strange Mr Norrell (2004), in which magic has returned to England. The stories are written in a pastiche of 18th- and 19th-century styles and their tone is macabre as well as satirical. The volume was generally well-received, though some critics compared it unfavorably to Jonathan Strange.