Winternight Trilogy

The second book in Katherine Arden’s Winternight Trilogy came out in December, and it was the last book I read in 2017.  I finished it on December 31st, while on a morning flight home after spending a frigid night in O’Hare Airport.  A Winternight indeed!  I had a cold at the time, making me exactly the type of passenger I dread sitting next to on a plane.  Although I wasn’t pleased with myself, I did empathize with Vasya as she endured an illness in the snow-shrouded Russian wilderness!

The Girl in the Tower is a less evocative title than The Bear and the Nightingale (the first book in the series), but it does evoke Vasya’s greatest fear.  She might be living in a fairy tale, but she is not cut out to be the titular character!  There are reasons both domestic and foreign that validate Vasya’s fear of being sequestered in a tower for the remainder of her natural (and unnatural?) life.

My state of mind (and head cold) may have tinged my impression of this book with grey (making it more authentic in the sense of a Russian winter?), but I liked it less than the slower and more spectral first book.  My review of The Bear and the Nightingale consisted of naught but a comment on the author’s educational background, however, so it’s time to do this right!  Penguin Random House has issued me a copy of The Bear and the Nightingale to give away with my review of The Girl in the Tower.  Leave a comment below to be entered into a random drawing.  One lucky winner will be selected and notified on Friday, February 2nd.  It’s a little late for the release of The Girl in the Tower, but the third book, The Winter of the Witch, comes out in August!  Happy Winternight reading!

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