The Bear and the Nightingale and The Girl In The Tower by Katherine Arden
Maybe I'm naturally inclined to fall in love with stories of brave, magical girls in medieval worlds who are not the typical princesses or damsels. Now that I write that I'm thinking "Well, duh I love those kinds of stories. Why wouldn't I? WHO WOULDN'T?". I think a large majority of the books I love end up being brave, magical girls in faraway times and places. My Grammy asked over Thanksgiving last year...do you ever read non-surreal books? I had to think for a moment. I like what I like! Although, I should probably work on getting a little more variety in reading diet. It's just so hard when there are books like this out there. Actually - this isn't just a fantasy novel. It has history in it. It's set in Medieval Russia so yea...variety.
There's a lot of parts and thoughts of my experience with the books that I want to share. I think it's safe for you to assume that I highly suggest that you read them. AND when you do so...know that they are part of a trilogy. The third and final installment will be released next year!
I don't think the author meant to write a trilogy. The Bear and the Nightingale was her debut novel (neat note - she wrote it in Hawaii. Interesting since it's set in Russia and predominantly in the winter time). Bear and Nightingale could stand on it's own however its one of those novels in which finding out that there are more stories to be written makes you deeply, deeply happy as a person, a reader, and a human.
And so, without further ado...I introduce the best damn thing I've blogged about all year.
The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden |
| Visual Description: A wintery night-time forest (colored blue) is pictured with a mysterious glowing cabin and a figure of a girlish woman entering it. |
Publishing: January 10th, 2017. Del Rey Books
Page Count: Hardcover, 322 pages.
"At the edge of the Russian wilderness, winter lasts most of the year and the snowdrifts grow taller than houses. But Vasilisa doesn’t mind—she spends the winter nights huddled around the embers of a fire with her beloved siblings, listening to her nurse’s fairy tales. Above all, she loves the chilling story of Frost, the blue-eyed winter demon, who appears in the frigid night to claim unwary souls. After Vasilisa’s mother dies, her father goes to Moscow and brings home a new wife. Fiercely devout, city-bred, Vasilisa’s new stepmother forbids her family from honoring the household spirits. The family acquiesces, but Vasilisa is frightened, sensing that more hinges upon their rituals than anyone knows. And indeed, crops begin to fail, evil creatures of the forest creep nearer, and misfortune stalks the village. As danger circles, Vasilisa must defy even the people she loves and call on dangerous gifts she has long concealed—this, in order to protect her family from a threat that seems to have stepped from her nurse’s most frightening tales." - Nabbed from Goodreads
We start out slow, drawing out the foundation and foreshadowing possibilities for extended story telling, and giving us enough time to feel the loss and tragedy of Vasya's tragic birth and her mother's decision. We meet her family before we even meet her. And it is this opening picture that sews the emotional core to the reader's subconscious mind. The span of time encompassed in this first book's plot is over sixteen years so while Vasya (Vasilisa) is just a little girl (getting into scrapes) we learn about the political and grown up decisions that lead her unfortunate step mother to be married to her father. Vasya's home is deep within the wilderness. Her Father is a a great Lord but in the first scenes he is in the stables helping an animal give birth to a baby.
Arden does an illustrious job of bringing feudal Russia alive for the reader. A giant oven with a bed over for it for the elderly and sick, descriptions of food (or the lack of it), women covering their hair, the use of a steaming bath house, dangers and lore of distant 'Tatars' invading, reverence of paint icons. A poetical voice lyrically and quaintly describes the world in a way that could only be described from someone who lived in that world. You forget that the author wrote this in Hawaii, had gone to college, grew up with TV and cereal for breakfast, and knows (I'm assuming!) how to work a microwave.
And the CREATURES...the magical, strange, ancient creatures! Everything it seems has a guardian or a creature of its own. A little stout man creature protects the hearth, a prophecy giving bathhouse spirit, a guardian caretaker of the horses in the stables. You will fall in love with them like I did. Russia folklore creatures are both fairies and goblins rolled up in one. Both terrible and endearing. Strange and familiar. Good and bad.
Family and the love that is held by Vasya's family is absolutely rejuvenating. From the premise and the death of her mother in the start you might naturally assume that Arden will follow the trope that Vasya is forlorn and unwanted by her family. Despite her step-mother's malice against her Vasya is given nothing but love and loyalty from her siblings - even from her half-sister (her step-mother's daughter). Her brothers protect and love her. Her father loves her and though his attempts might be stunted by his perceptions of the world and as it 'should be' - he loves her and that love is rarely if ever questioned by the audience. Her grandmotherly nurse Dunya is a mother and guardian to them all. Their home is cozy and warm because of the strength of their family.
And that warmth and strength is what keeps both Vasya and us readers going when the Vasya's world steadily becomes more narrow, more dangerous, and more mysterious. By the time we are in the middle of the book she is a strong-willed teenager who does not fit the cage that, as a woman of that time, she was born to, a Frost King has been seeking her since she was a girl, a Priest is obsessed with her, her tormented step-mother conspires against her, her Father wants to marry her off (apparently the Dad Solution of feudal Russia - get your daughter married so she'll settle down....it doesn't go as planned to NO one's surprise), and the ancient creatures that only Vasya and one other can see are warning of a Bear and it's awakening, and a horrible winter to come. And yes, she definitely inherited her mysterious grandmother's mystical abilities.
If I go further, I will give spoilers. And I don't want to do that. Not for the first book! So, go forth, read away!
Arden does an illustrious job of bringing feudal Russia alive for the reader. A giant oven with a bed over for it for the elderly and sick, descriptions of food (or the lack of it), women covering their hair, the use of a steaming bath house, dangers and lore of distant 'Tatars' invading, reverence of paint icons. A poetical voice lyrically and quaintly describes the world in a way that could only be described from someone who lived in that world. You forget that the author wrote this in Hawaii, had gone to college, grew up with TV and cereal for breakfast, and knows (I'm assuming!) how to work a microwave.
And the CREATURES...the magical, strange, ancient creatures! Everything it seems has a guardian or a creature of its own. A little stout man creature protects the hearth, a prophecy giving bathhouse spirit, a guardian caretaker of the horses in the stables. You will fall in love with them like I did. Russia folklore creatures are both fairies and goblins rolled up in one. Both terrible and endearing. Strange and familiar. Good and bad.
Family and the love that is held by Vasya's family is absolutely rejuvenating. From the premise and the death of her mother in the start you might naturally assume that Arden will follow the trope that Vasya is forlorn and unwanted by her family. Despite her step-mother's malice against her Vasya is given nothing but love and loyalty from her siblings - even from her half-sister (her step-mother's daughter). Her brothers protect and love her. Her father loves her and though his attempts might be stunted by his perceptions of the world and as it 'should be' - he loves her and that love is rarely if ever questioned by the audience. Her grandmotherly nurse Dunya is a mother and guardian to them all. Their home is cozy and warm because of the strength of their family.
And that warmth and strength is what keeps both Vasya and us readers going when the Vasya's world steadily becomes more narrow, more dangerous, and more mysterious. By the time we are in the middle of the book she is a strong-willed teenager who does not fit the cage that, as a woman of that time, she was born to, a Frost King has been seeking her since she was a girl, a Priest is obsessed with her, her tormented step-mother conspires against her, her Father wants to marry her off (apparently the Dad Solution of feudal Russia - get your daughter married so she'll settle down....it doesn't go as planned to NO one's surprise), and the ancient creatures that only Vasya and one other can see are warning of a Bear and it's awakening, and a horrible winter to come. And yes, she definitely inherited her mysterious grandmother's mystical abilities.
If I go further, I will give spoilers. And I don't want to do that. Not for the first book! So, go forth, read away!
Disclaimer: Spoilers (mild but telling!) lay below!
The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden
 |
| Visual description: A silhouette of a girl on a horse galloping down a slope. A large tower rises behind her and in the background the slopes towers of Moscow look hazy. The sun is rising in the background. Snow flake flurries dust the illustration. |
Publishing: December 5th 2017
Page Count: Hardover, 363 pages.
Find the Author: (same as above, lol)
"Orphaned and cast out as a witch by her village, Vasya’s options are few: resign herself to life in a convent, or allow her older sister to make her a match with a Moscovite prince. Both doom her to life in a tower, cut off from the vast world she longs to explore. So instead she chooses adventure, disguising herself as a boy and riding her horse into the woods. When a battle with some bandits who have been terrorizing the countryside earns her the admiration of the Grand Prince of Moscow, she must carefully guard the secret of her gender to remain in his good graces—even as she realizes his kingdom is under threat from mysterious forces only she will be able to stop." - Nabbed from Goodreads blurb.
She literally just unwittingly throws herself into the fire and then she realizes she's in the fire - she just keeps doing her thing. In 'Nightingale' (don't we love Solovey!?) though she was in danger - she was in the safety of her home. Sure, that home was surrounded by neighbors who called her a witch, the guardian spirits were dying, and vampires were literally rising up from the grave to claw at their door at night - but it was still home. The action, the stakes, the choices are far more daunting and heart-pounding. Little Vasya has grown up. She becomes a woman but on her own terms. And if you think the harshness of her childhood realities was heavy? It has absolutely nothing on Moscow.
Like in the first book - we are introduced first to her family. In this case - it is her sister and brother (Olya and Sasha) in Moscow. Instead of one chapter - we spend a good chunk with them setting up the environment that we know that Vasya is destined to be in eventually. Women aren't just sheltered and covered - they are secluded, separated, partitioned away from the men. They can only go out to church and to visit to each other. If a woman was to step out of this norm - they would bring disgrace and ruin to their family and the repercussions could be a matter of home or no home. On the plus side - her niece sees a ghost of a mysterious girl wandering around. It turns out that Vasya is not the only one who inherited the mysterious grandmother's gifts.
There are new creatures and some familiar. Vasya has wholeheartedly accepted the mysterious, supernatural world that only she can see. She willingly wishes to learn about her gifts and uses her connection to the supernatural to save herself and others. Solovey is her constant and amusing companion. And whether he likes it or not - Morozco cannot help but watch over her.
The relationship between her and her siblings are more tense and partially questionable than we are used to. These siblings have lived in the dangerous world of Moscow and her appearance is dangerous and startling to their world. It's sad to see the stress between her and her siblings when in Nightingale the love she had for her siblings and that they had for her kept everything going in the darkest times. In the darkest times of this story - Vasya must rely on herself.
I can't go much further without giving away things I don't believe should be given away.
The same illustrious voice narrates and weaves the new faces of feudal, medieval Russia and yet it matches the new daunting, adventurous pace. Where we spent a whole book to meander through her childhood and to set up her world in 'Nightingale' - we cover a few months in one book in 'Tower'. The tempo is like a fire. At first it's just a flicker, kindling, then it lights and the embers burn, and it slowly crackles and starts to light, and then all of a sudden - it takes off! And when it burns - it burns with passion, heartbreak, and magic.
There's so many tidbits thrown out through the book - questions that are leading and need to be answered. Where does the magic come from? Her grandmother - who was she and who was her people? The legacy of a line of witches and the weight of being born different in a world where being different and a woman at the same time was considered a curse is explored. What will happen to Morozko when no one believes in him? Some questions are answered in this story and some are still yet to be faced...
So. Go read. It's worth it.
Until next time,
Jess
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