The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

“It is the lot of women.”

★★★★★

Vasilisa lives in the medieval Russian country side, where the winters are cruel. She loves her nurse, Sasha (who has been a mother to her since her own mother died), her brothers and roaming the woods. Vasilisa, or Vasya, is a peculiar child, seeing things that shouldn’t be real. When her father decides to remarry, seven years after her mother’s death, things get hard for Vasya. Her new stepmother, traumatized herself by a long life spent in fear and a forced marriage, takes her frustration out on Vasya. But there are worse things about to happen, as her new stepmother and the new priest both forbid the worshipping of the house spirits, who are the only creatures able to defend Vasya, her family and the villagers against the deep, dark winter that is coming.

Usually I’m not big on fairytale retellings, as most seem overdone and unoriginal to me, but this book was completely and utterly amazing. The book starts with the nurse, Sasha, who tells a story of how a maiden was married off to Morozko (the Russian Jack Frost) by her evil step-mother, but returned with riches because she had been so polite. When the stepmother sends her own nasty, mean daughter to do the same thing, the daughter dies. This book is basically a rendition of that traditional story (which makes the story in the beginning even more interesting, as if the book is self-aware) but so, so much richer in detail and complexity. Because nothing in real life is as simple as a fairytale. Barely anyone is ever evil just ‘cuz.

In The Bear and the Nightingale characters are complex in ways that barely any fantasy novel even dares to touch upon, and most “literary” novels can’t even accomplish. It’s shows so beautifully how difficult it is to classify people as good and evil, that good people can do bad things, that bad people can do good things (accidentally or on purpose), and that most of the time people simply do what is best for themselves whatever the consequences and then try to convince themselves they’re good people. But everyone has their reasons, their traumas, their upbringing, and while terrible behavior isn’t condoned here, this novel shows it’s never so simple as in the fairy tales.

The Bear and the Nightingale is first and foremost, in my opinion, a story of women and how they try to survive and accept their lot in life. In this world, a woman is not free to choose how she lives her life, she is expected to marry young and be a mother and an obedient wife the rest of her life, or perhaps, if her father lets her, waste away in a convent. The book shows this struggle and the problems the suppression and the abuse inevitably cause. It’s a story of what happens when you traumatize people by forcing them into lives they never wanted, abuse them when they don’t cooperate and then declare them insane when they show signs of that trauma. Things go wrong, society breaks. But the story never points a clear finger, it simply shows the characters and their stories, and it’s then up to the reader to decide what character’s behavior they think is wrong. I love a book that doesn’t underestimate its readers and their critical thinking abilities. And this makes the characters so much more life-like, than when they’d simply been ‘bad’ or ‘good’. We get to know these characters so well, know their thoughts and feelings and histories, and they’re all so unique. Even their inner voice feels different for every character, which doesn’t happen often in books.  Honestly, characters are just so vividly alive, they almost feel real.

Besides the amazing character portrayal’s and the deep psychological themes, this is also simply a terrific fantasy story. I’m personally a great enthusiast of Northern European folklore and this book was an utter delight. It’s full of house spirits and wood creatures that are never polished, but are as raw and dangerous as they are supposed to be.
The writing too, is amazing, always pulling me into the world, into the character’s lives. I especially love how Arden used slightly archaic language, just changing word order just so or simply using an old-fashioned expression to convey this old world the characters live in. It’s really masterfully dont. Honestly, I’d like to write a full analystic essay on this book, it’s that rich with layers and meaning.

The Bear and the Nightingale is a book that has everything I ever wanted: interesting and three-dimensional female characters, a great portrayal of the complexity of life in such a time and such a place, magic, adventure, rebellion, courage, house spirits and frost demons. Honestly now one of my favorite books of all time. I’ll be looking forward to the next two books in the trilogy!

 

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