The Bear and the Nightingale

The Bear and the Nightingale
By: Katherine Arden
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 5 stars

Summary:
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. Wise Russians fear him, her nurse says, and honor the spirits of house and yard and forest that protect their homes from evil.

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. All the while, Vasilisa's stepmother grows ever harsher in her determination to groom her rebellious stepdaughter for either marriage or confinement in a convent.
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. 
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My Thoughts:
I have been lucking out with this round of Reader's Choice books at my library. I have loved all of the ones I have read thus far and each has been vastly different. So good on you Salt Lake County Librarians! Keep the good recommendations coming.

Oh what a wondrous fairy tale. Perfect to bring out on a cold winter night and take yourself to far away places. I often imagine myself reading books to my future children at night, and this is definitely going to be one of those. 

My experience with Russian literature is not extensive, the 3 Russian pieces that all American’s seem to read – War and Peace, Anna Karenina, and Crime and Punishment are the extent of my actual Russian exposure. But that was enough to make me love it. The cadence of the stories, the blend of the Christian, the Pagan and the Human, and he rich sentence structure (yes it was translated and I know that language itself is lost in the translation but there is just this feel in Russian writings that I don’t really find anywhere else)

I found this here. Yes the author is from the US, but she did spend time in Russia and studying Russian literature and at least to me it is reflected beautifully here. I loved the power and depth of the characters. I love how other worldly it felt. I want to learn more about Vasilisa  and her powers. And I’m very excited that we will get to do so.

She is so incredibly strong, yet also fragile. Fiercely loyal to her family, but also to the truth she knows to exist. She trusts herself and will not be swayed by the insistence of others, yet she balances her fierce spirit with a respect for the beliefs and lives of others. She is a character I wouldn’t want to sip coffee with, she is that fairy tale heroine who you look upto but could never touch. She is a wood-sprite, with a spirit part of me wishes to have and a freedom that I think everyone secretly or not desires. There is dignity and power to her, she isn’t immortal, the danger she faces is real Highlight for spoiler: and I never assumed that she would end up surviving the whole book. (Yes, I know there are sequels, but when Death is one of your characters really anything is possible)

And can we look at the Priest for a minute. He is such a complex mess of human follies. He has many talents, his painting and is voice are a siren’s call – there is magic in him that simply isn’t viewed as such. He is set on a path of grandeur while young and thrown from it without any say in the matter. He is prideful rather than pious, he is so far from the God he professes to serve that it is no wonder how he ended up.

I need friends to read this! I want to talk about it. To go over the characters, the story, the themes. To speak of bravery, loyalty - to self and to family, and of owning your destiny. Would I recommend this book? Most definitely. It is for those who are finally old enough to read fairy tales again, those who like the feel of Russia but don’t necessarily want to spend the eternity it takes to read War & Peace and for those who want a story with a strong female character that isn’t bogged down by romance.

Once you have read it, let me know – we can go out for a hot chocolate and discuss. I can’t wait to chat with you.