George MacDonald 
Cross Purposes and The Shadows (Barnes & Noble Digital Library) 

This 1862 volume contains two of Mac Donald’s fairy stories.  In the first, the Queen of Fairyland determines to bring two mortals to her realm in order to provide some excitement, and in the second, a mortal, Ralph Rinkelmann, is elected king of the fairies.

Circa l’autore

George Mac Donald (1824-1905) was a Scottish novelist, poet, and Christian minister whose fairy tales and fantasies inspired such later luminaries as J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton, and Neil Gaiman.  His best-remembered works include At the Back of the North Wind (1871), The Princess and the Goblin (1872), and Lilith (1895).