The Bear and the Nightingale

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Manufacturer: Katherine Arden
Brand: Fantasy Fiction, Historical Fantasy
Brew: Audiobook
Steeping Time: 11 hours 48 minutes
Tea Service: Book Club
Strength:

Synopsis: 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. Above all, Vasya loves the story of Frost, the blue-eyed winter demon. Wise Russians fear him, for he claims unwary souls, and they honor the spirits that protect their homes from evil.

Then Vasya’s widowed father brings home a new wife from Moscow. Fiercely devout, Vasya’s stepmother forbids her family from honoring their household spirits, but Vasya fears what this may bring. And indeed, misfortune begins to stalk the village.

But 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. 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.

The Bear and the Nightingale is such a wonderful folklore story.

The pace is a slow burn. If you need tons of action in a book, this one may not be for you. It is written in a long-form way that paints a deep and rich picture of the people and their surroundings. I’m sure that listening to the audiobook intensified this feeling, but it felt like I was sitting with Vasya and her family, huddled around the oven for warmth, listening to Dunya, their nurse, tell the tale. It’s the kind of tale that you don’t get in one sitting, but you know that the story will pick up right where it left off when you gather back around the oven the next evening. I felt like I was living amongst the characters, which I really enjoyed.

I love folklore stories.

You can learn so much about a culture by listening to their tales, and this one is no different. It gave me Daughter of the Forest vibes, and I love it for that.

The first quarter or so of the book lays out the history and backstory that bring us to the ‘present-day,’ medieval Russia. We witness what happens to Vasya’s family leading up to her birth and then the actions that lead to her father, Pyotr, marrying Anna, the daughter of the Grand Prince of Moscow. She holds great standing but is also rumored to be mad. Pyotr returns to his village with his new wife, Anna, and a new village priest, Konstantin. The majority of The Bear and the Nightingale follows Vasya from this point onward. The book is told in third person limited, and we see bits and pieces from multiple character perspectives, but Vasya is our overall main character. The story revolves around her, the old magic that she can see and interact with, and those trying to wipe out that old magic in the name of a newer religion, Christianity.

Vasya is a strong-willed girl who grows into a strong-willed woman that is brave and sure of herself.

Like any novel set in a time of long ago, this is highly frowned upon. She should be quiet and submissive, eager to serve, wed, and bear children. I loved Vasya as a protagonist. She is the kind of stubborn that I adore and that I wish I could be more like. She is determined to follow her heart and forge her own path forward.

The antagonists are also perfect; the kind you love to hate. But there is room for sympathy with them, which is even more maddening. It is easy to understand why Anna acts the way that she does, and it’s easy to understand why Konstantin believes he’s doing the right thing. I think these types of characters make the best antagonists. They’re not being cruel or evil for the sheer enjoyment of it, but they truly think they are in the right and are doing what’s best for everyone. Those are the scary ones.

Things start to hit a fever-pitch in the last quarter of The Bear and the Nightingale.

Events get downright creepy, which is what I’m here for! I won’t throw out any spoilers, but this is where we meet some of my favorite characters. I really enjoyed the relationship between Vasya and Morozko, and I fell in love with Solovey instantly. The mythical creatures Vasya interacts with, such as the domovoy (the spirit that lives in the oven) and the spirit that lives in the barn, are among my favorites as well. The world that Katherine Arden has created is one that I’m eager to keep living in.

The only thing I struggled with in this book is the names. Like many other people, the characters in this book have nicknames. For example, Vasya is the shortened version of Vasilisa. Dunya is also called Dunyashka, and so on. It took me a while to sort out which nicknames belonged to which full name, but once you get the hang of it, you’re golden.

If you’re interested in folklore, mythology, or fairy tales, I think you’ll enjoy The Bear and the Nightingale. It is the first book in the trilogy, but I feel that book one ended well enough that you could stop there if you wanted to. Personally, I’ll be picking up book 2, The Girl in the Tower, very soon!

Have you read The Bear and the Nightingale? Leave a comment and let me know what you thought about it! Want to read it for yourself? Click here to get a copy of your own.
Cheers,
Lydia