Publication Date: May 2022
Blurb:
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.
What To Expect:
The Bear and the Nightingale is the first book in the Winternight Trilogy, a fantasy series set in medieval Russia. You can expect elements of folklore and magic, a coming-of-age story, and lyrical writing.
Content Warnings:
Language: Mild
Sexual Content: Mild – Light kissing and vague innuendo
Violence: Moderate – Death and violence against both animals and humans (with some descriptions of blood and gore) abuse and sexual assault (including child abuse)
Substance Use: Moderate – Mead and honey wine is drunk by people of all ages throughout the novel as a normal part of the life and culture of the time period.
Prejudices: Moderate – Sexism, religious fear of witches
Religious Themes: Much of the story deals with the friction between medieval Christianity and the ancient traditions of the region (centered on frost demons), which honor beings from mythology that do exist in this novel. There are protagonists and antagonists on both sides of the conflict.
Other Topics: Loss of parents
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