According to Dunya, the cold evil that serves Morozko is only kept away from the villages because the peasants honor and feed the spirits of their ancestors.Īs she grows older, Vasya’s magical powers start to show themselves. She is raised by Marina’s old nursemaid, Dunya, who spends the evenings telling Vasya scary stories about Ivan and the Gray Wolf, the Firebird, and most terrifying of all, Morozko, the demonic king of winter. Vasilisa, nicknamed Vasya, grows up wild and adventurous, rebelling against the behavior that is supposed to be appropriate for girls. But when Marina prays to the old gods for a special child who would inherit her bloodline’s latent magical powers, she gives birth to Vasilisa and dies in childbirth. He and his wife, Marina, are almost completely happy protecting the peasants and raising their four children. In medieval Rus, Lord Pyotr Vladimirovich’s northern estate encompasses several villages at the edge of the wild forest. Writing in the fantasy genre that mixes realism with magic, Arden sets her story in the wintry darkness that backgrounds many Russian fairy tales, while updating the attitudes and gender politics of the time for a modern audience. The Bear and the Nightingale tells the coming of age story of a girl whose bond with the supernatural traditions of her village comes into conflict with the spreading influence of Christianity. She currently lives in Vermont.In 2017, American author Katherine Arden published the first of her trilogy of young adult fantasy novels featuring elements of Russian folklore. She has lived in Russia and France, and studied both Russian and French Literature in college. Katherine Arden is the author of the Winternight Trilogy: The Bear and The Nightingale, The Girl in the Tower, and The Winter of the Witch. I’d rather my sons living, and my daughters safe, than a chance at glory for unborn descendants. We who live forever can know no courage, nor do we love enough to give our lives. It is a cruel task, to frighten people in God’s name. As the village’s defenses weaken and evil from the forest creeps nearer, Vasilisa must call upon dangerous gifts she has long concealed-to protect her family from a threat sprung to life from her nurse’s most frightening tales. And indeed, misfortune begins to stalk the village.īut Vasya’s stepmother only grows harsher, determined to remake the village to her liking and to groom her rebellious stepdaughter for marriage or a convent. Fiercely devout, Vasya’s stepmother forbids her family from honoring their household spirits, but Vasya fears what this may bring. Then Vasya’s widowed father brings home a new wife from Moscow. Wise Russians fear him, for he claims unwary souls, and they honor the spirits that protect their homes from evil. Above all, Vasya loves the story of Frost, the blue-eyed winter demon. Winter lasts most of the year at the edge of the Russian wilderness, and in the long nights, Vasilisa and her siblings love to gather by the fire to listen to their nurse’s fairy tales. Arden beautifully blends folklore with an unforgettable atmospheric fantasy and gives a vibrant female heroine for you to fall in love with. I was completely drawn into Katherine Arden’s imaginative historical fantasy series describing the conflict between Christianity and paganism in 1300s Russia. When Vasya’s mother dies and her father remarries, her stepmother forbids the pagan practices, the tweaked household spirits cannot protect them from a growing evil. She loves to hear tales of spirits who live that protect their home from evil, especially of the Frost Demon. In medieval Russia, Vasya and her family live in the far north, where winter lasts most of the year. Audiobook Length: 11 hours and 48 minutes
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