The Winter King and the annoying maiden

I had first planned to compare Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver and Katherine Arden's The Bear and the Nightingale, as they are both (though only partly in Novik's case) inspired by Russian folklore, have similar settings and both feature a Winter King as one of the mystical characters that appear. However, I'm reading Spinning Silver right now and enjoying it a great deal more than Arden's book. (Though, in view of its main, non-Russian fairy-tale inspiration, it has a distinct "Hamlet without the Prince" feel about it.) A comparison would mostly be about me liking Spinning Silver better, so maybe it's a little more fair to look at Arden's novel in its own right. I still have problems with it, though.

I feel a little bad about this, because it's not as if The Bear and the Nightingale is a badly written book. On the contrary, it's impressive and well put together, and the Russian folk-tale creatures give an interesting flavour to the proceedings. Though Vasya, the book's heroine, is pally with most of them, it is made clear that they have their own agenda and aren't really interested in taking sides in a Good versus Evil showdown - a characteristic in fairy-tale creatures that is often missing in more streamlined fantasy yarns. However, I for my part couldn't stand Vasya. "Mercy me, not another wild child heroine" was my first reaction (I was out of temper with Game of Thrones' Arya killing the Night King at the time), and she did little to grow on me after that.

As someone who has been a villain-lover all my life, I can confidently claim that mostly, it doesn't matter if you root for the "wrong" character in a book, film or TV series. It simply gives you a different perspective, and the work itself isn't ruined for you. However, when the whole narrative is constructed around the reader/viewer liking a certain character, then having your sympathies knocked off course can have serious consequences. In The Bear and the Nightingale, everyone - including her enemies - somehow or other think that Vasya is a big deal, and so if the reader remains sceptical, it's hard to get into the story. Vasya is the youngest child of a wealthy landowner in Medieval not-quite-Russia-yet. Her mother, whose mother had magic but who has none herself, longs for a magical daughter and so gives birth to Vasya while dying. Vasya can see magical creatures and generally has the Gift. Once when she's lost in the forest during one of her adventures, she runs into the Winter King and his wicked, chained, one-eyed brother - The Bear of the title - who both take an interest in her powers. The Winter King tasks her father to give his daughter a talisman meant to protect Vasya, but her old nurse hides away the talisman until the girl is "old enough". She and the Winter King (and it has to be said this reader - for pity's sake, just give her the thing!) have differing opinions as to when exactly "old enough" is.

I did feel for one character in this novel, but unfortunately it wasn't Vasya. Her stepmother, Anna, sees magical creatures too but believes them to be demons, and is miserable for thinking herself mad. The chapter that introduces her really kindled my sympathy for her terrible predicament, but as she's not a kind stepmother to Vasya, we're supposedly not meant to care too much. At any rate, no-one in the book does. Not Vasya, who knows what's really going on, but doesn't bother to have a heart-to-heart with her stepmother about who the creatures really are. (Because she's afraid of being outed as a witch? But isn't she supposed to be fearless?) Not the village's new priest, Father Konstantin, sent out in the neck of the woods as he's considered too dangerously charismatic in the city. When Anna confides in him, he first seems to take her seriously and talks about exorcism, but it soon becomes clear that there's only one person he's interested in "exorcising": Vasya, now in her teens, for whom he has the hots.

So, to sum up: the magical creatures all think the world of the wild, fey and sensually attractive Vasya and teach her useful skills such as expert horse-riding; Father Konstantin desires her; a neighbouring landowner has his eye on her; her stepmother is jealous of her; the Winter King himself is drawn to her and at one point gives her a horse who is also a nightingale and who is, naturally, devoted to her. It's what you could call the Ross Poldark syndrome. If you're into Ross, then you will like Poldark which is mostly about how great he is; and in this case, if you warm to Vasya you will probably enjoy this book (the first of a trilogy) hugely.

I didn't, and this may just be my own personal hang-ups. I was suffering from wild child fatigue and was indignant about how no-one cared about poor Anna's plight while gushing about Vasya. But I do think there's a bit more to it than that. There was nothing to latch on to when it came to Vasya except her being feisty and the champion of folk-tale spirits. Novik's heroines, if I'm allowed to compare just a little, are flawed and complex in another way: they try to live their lives as best they can without bothering about whether they're "empowering"or not. As it happens, they kind of are, but that's not their reason for being. In short, I did not understand the Vasya hype, which is one reason I remained unimpressed by the Winter King. The scenes with potential romantic tension between him and Vasya had me rolling my eyes. "In the stories, the bird-prince and the wicked sorcerer - they only come for the wild maiden", Vasya's nurse says to her father when they discuss marrying her off fast so the Winter King doesn't get his mitts on her. Now there's a depressing thought.

Father Konstantin's campaign against the old ways - ways which involve leaving gifts for household spirits and which he considers unholy - was a storyline that left me pretty cold. Konstantin is first set up as a serious antagonist with remarkable good looks and real talents when it comes to preaching and painting icons, but he becomes increasingly daft as the story goes on, and the supposed clash of beliefs is hard to get involved in. However, it must be said that as soon as the real villain of the piece seriously enters the story, the plot thickens and grows more exciting. The Bear is sketchy when it comes to personality, but I had some time for him as a fairy-tale threat. He plays his cards well, and even shows some appreciation of Anna's gifts - admittedly, because he wants to kill her and feast on her fear, but even so. I will probably read the next part of the trilogy, The Girl in the Tower, at some point, and then I'll be interested to see what he gets up to next.