You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.75 AVERAGE
3.75 AVERAGE
A multi Layered mystery with occasional bouts of horror - excellent!
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I wanted to love this book as the previous reviews were so positive, but I found it's pacing so uneven that I had trouble investing in any of the characters. Perhaps the Scandinavian themed historical fiction is not my thing.....
In Sweden, a 'wolf winter' is a particularly long and brutal season, “the kind of winter that will remind us we are mortal … mortal and alone...” Cecelia Ekbäck's atmospheric, tense and brooding debut, Wolf Winter, opens in high summer, but the discovery of a mutilated body augurs the dark season to come.
Multiple characters share point-of-view time, but it is Maija and her elder daughter Frederika whose grip on the story's reins steers the narrative. Maija and her family have only just arrived from Finland to take over a dead relative's homestead when Frederika comes across the body of local man. It's presumed he was slain by a pack of wolves, but the nature of wounds would suggest otherwise.
Ekbäck pairs a murder mystery with finely-crafted historical fiction. Set in Swedish Lapland in 1717, Wolf Winter immerses the reader in an isolated collection of homesteads clinging to Blackäsen Mountain, as well as the politics of a monarchy on the edge of collapse. She shows us the power granted to clergy in holding together communities strung out over vast terrain and the power of legend in feeding suspicion and fear.
Wolf Winter joins other northern latitude noir literary fiction, such as Stef Penny's The Tenderness of Wolves (more wolves!), Eowyn Ivey's The Snow Child, David Vann's Caribou Island and Hannah Kent's Burial Rites, where frozen landscapes exact a dark tone, a ponderous pace, an otherworldly struggle for survival against elements both natural and abnormal.
The author set herself an enormous challenge for her debut: a blend of genres that relies on tight control of pacing, yet demands a rich tapestry of detail and exposition. There is a certain superfluity to some village scenes, a need to make certain the reader understands the distant political wranglings, but these are mild complaints set against a deliciously shivery tale rendered in gorgeous, pitch-perfect prose. After this impressive debut, I can't wait to see what she does next.
Multiple characters share point-of-view time, but it is Maija and her elder daughter Frederika whose grip on the story's reins steers the narrative. Maija and her family have only just arrived from Finland to take over a dead relative's homestead when Frederika comes across the body of local man. It's presumed he was slain by a pack of wolves, but the nature of wounds would suggest otherwise.
Ekbäck pairs a murder mystery with finely-crafted historical fiction. Set in Swedish Lapland in 1717, Wolf Winter immerses the reader in an isolated collection of homesteads clinging to Blackäsen Mountain, as well as the politics of a monarchy on the edge of collapse. She shows us the power granted to clergy in holding together communities strung out over vast terrain and the power of legend in feeding suspicion and fear.
Wolf Winter joins other northern latitude noir literary fiction, such as Stef Penny's The Tenderness of Wolves (more wolves!), Eowyn Ivey's The Snow Child, David Vann's Caribou Island and Hannah Kent's Burial Rites, where frozen landscapes exact a dark tone, a ponderous pace, an otherworldly struggle for survival against elements both natural and abnormal.
The author set herself an enormous challenge for her debut: a blend of genres that relies on tight control of pacing, yet demands a rich tapestry of detail and exposition. There is a certain superfluity to some village scenes, a need to make certain the reader understands the distant political wranglings, but these are mild complaints set against a deliciously shivery tale rendered in gorgeous, pitch-perfect prose. After this impressive debut, I can't wait to see what she does next.
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Cecilia Ekback’s Wolf Winter begins in Swedish Lapland in June 1717, with siblings Frederika and Dorothea. The girls, fourteen and six years old respectively, make a significant discovery near their new home on isolated Blackasen Mountain – the mutilated body of a man.
The sometimes simplistic prose within Wolf Winter allows the darker passages to be incredibly vivid. On finding the body, for example, Ekback writes: ‘It was a dead man there in the glade. He stared at Frederika with cloudy eyes. He lay bent. Broken. His stomach was torn open, his insides on the grass violently red, stringy’. At first, the attack is put down to the work of a bear, but things take a darker tone as the novel goes on.
The girls’ family have their own troubles. They have moved from ‘the waters of Finland’ to ‘the forests of Sweden’ in order to escape their father’s night terrors, from which he wakes up ‘soaking wet, smelling salty of seaweed and rank like fish’. Ekback demonstrates the way in which other members of the family have had to make sacrifices in order to swap their old and rather beloved way of life for their new one: ‘But inside Maija [their mother], the wind still screamed. All these things they had left behind, and yet her husband had chosen to bring his fear’.
Ekback sets the scene well in just a few words, and her imagery – particularly with regard to the natural world around her protagonists – is beautiful: ‘The morning was bright; white daylight sliced the spruce tops and stirred up too much colour’. We also learn about Frederika’s view of the place rather early on: ‘… here, nothing could be fine. The forest was too dark. There was spidery mould among the twigs and on the ground beneath the lowest branches there were still patches of snow, hollow blue’. As one might expect, given the period and the Scandinavian setting, mythology is heavily entrenched within the world of the girls; they are led to believe that trolls live in the crevices which surround their home, for example.
Wolf Winter is an easy story to get into. Whilst the premise is haunting and intriguing, there are several elements which unfortunately let the whole down. The dialogue feels far too modern for the mostpart to work, and very few of the phrases which are uttered serve to anchor the storyline as they really should do. Some of the characters are a little too shadowy, and nothing feels quite realistic after a while. The first section of the novel is interesting, but those sections which follow do not quite live up to its opening, and it feels rather uneven in consequence.
The sometimes simplistic prose within Wolf Winter allows the darker passages to be incredibly vivid. On finding the body, for example, Ekback writes: ‘It was a dead man there in the glade. He stared at Frederika with cloudy eyes. He lay bent. Broken. His stomach was torn open, his insides on the grass violently red, stringy’. At first, the attack is put down to the work of a bear, but things take a darker tone as the novel goes on.
The girls’ family have their own troubles. They have moved from ‘the waters of Finland’ to ‘the forests of Sweden’ in order to escape their father’s night terrors, from which he wakes up ‘soaking wet, smelling salty of seaweed and rank like fish’. Ekback demonstrates the way in which other members of the family have had to make sacrifices in order to swap their old and rather beloved way of life for their new one: ‘But inside Maija [their mother], the wind still screamed. All these things they had left behind, and yet her husband had chosen to bring his fear’.
Ekback sets the scene well in just a few words, and her imagery – particularly with regard to the natural world around her protagonists – is beautiful: ‘The morning was bright; white daylight sliced the spruce tops and stirred up too much colour’. We also learn about Frederika’s view of the place rather early on: ‘… here, nothing could be fine. The forest was too dark. There was spidery mould among the twigs and on the ground beneath the lowest branches there were still patches of snow, hollow blue’. As one might expect, given the period and the Scandinavian setting, mythology is heavily entrenched within the world of the girls; they are led to believe that trolls live in the crevices which surround their home, for example.
Wolf Winter is an easy story to get into. Whilst the premise is haunting and intriguing, there are several elements which unfortunately let the whole down. The dialogue feels far too modern for the mostpart to work, and very few of the phrases which are uttered serve to anchor the storyline as they really should do. Some of the characters are a little too shadowy, and nothing feels quite realistic after a while. The first section of the novel is interesting, but those sections which follow do not quite live up to its opening, and it feels rather uneven in consequence.
Up until the last 50 pages, I thought this MIGHT be a 5 star book; but then the ending, I felt, was BADLY bungled. Things were both too rushed and too opaque/enigmatic; am not even sure who did what to whom at this point.
Je suis déçue par cette lecture, d'autant plus que cela aurait pu être un vrai petit bijou. Il y avait tous les éléments que j'aime pour cette période de l'année : un huis clos dans un environnement recouvert par la neige. Un lieu où les soirées sont interminables et la nuit s'étire plus largement que le jour. Des personnages forts, modelés par l'instinct de survie, l'apreté du quotidien. Un personnage féminin au centre de l'histoire (accompagnée de ses deux filles), qui doivent survivre à l'hiver tandis que la peur se répand au sein de la communauté suite à la découverte d'un cadavre. Bref, un bijou en perspective.
Et bien non, malheureusement la magie n'a pas opéré. J'ai même fini le livre un peu laborieusement.
Le rythme m'a paru décousu, c'était soit beaucoup trop lent, soit trop rapide, comme si l'auteure n'était pas vraiment sûre de la vitesse à maintenir. Les rapports entre les personnages m'ont également déboussolés : le prêtre et Maija par exemple (un peu trop forcé à mon goût et ne correspondant franchement pas à leur personnalité). Certains passages devenaient cryptico-lyriques en plein milieu de l'intrigue. Et la fin s'acclère tellement qu'on reste presque étonné d'avoir tourné la dernière page. Bref disont que l'ensemble n'était pas très cohérent même si ce n'est pas une totale déconfiture.
Et bien non, malheureusement la magie n'a pas opéré. J'ai même fini le livre un peu laborieusement.
Le rythme m'a paru décousu, c'était soit beaucoup trop lent, soit trop rapide, comme si l'auteure n'était pas vraiment sûre de la vitesse à maintenir. Les rapports entre les personnages m'ont également déboussolés : le prêtre et Maija par exemple (un peu trop forcé à mon goût et ne correspondant franchement pas à leur personnalité). Certains passages devenaient cryptico-lyriques en plein milieu de l'intrigue. Et la fin s'acclère tellement qu'on reste presque étonné d'avoir tourné la dernière page. Bref disont que l'ensemble n'était pas très cohérent même si ce n'est pas une totale déconfiture.
Before Reading...
Summary gives me the vibe of [b:Burial Rites|17333319|Burial Rites|Hannah Kent|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1384207446s/17333319.jpg|21943144], which would definitely be a good thing.
After Reading...
Well if only it had given me the vibe of Burial Rites while I was reading it. Needless to say, it did not.
Perhaps I am simply not a fan of Nordic writing styles, or at least the Nordic writing style I seem to come across (like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo). This one reminded me of the aforementioned in that I failed to find the novel and writing appealing and I was left uninterested.
But regardless of my preference for writing styles, this book definitely had major flaws. I did not know if it was the author's first novel upon beginning it but I subsequently discovered it was and it was no surprise. The writing constantly reminded me of someone trying too hard to be clever or be noticed and ultimately failing to write an enjoyable novel.
The pacing in Wolf Winter was off and generally lacked a flowing style that made reading a bother. Statements were often odd and seemingly out of place, making you ponder what the hell the author was trying to convey, especially considering it often seemed out of context. POV changes occurred without indication, leaving the reader once again pondering. (As for the POV changes, there may have been page breaks etc. in the final product, but NetGalley's formatting was so poor I am unsure.)
But what ultimately made me abandon this book was the metaphors. Holy hell this book is heavy-handed with metaphors. And not just metaphors, but twisted and tortured metaphors that are oddly very specific and at times lengthy. The metaphors vacillated back and forth between poor and just plain distracting. Each page was weighed down with these metaphors that it made reading feel like a chore, a chore of digging through metaphors to find the little nuggets of info the author seemed to want to convey. Ultimately I chalk it up to a new author trying too hard.
I did not enjoy Wolf Winter and I would be unlikely to read the author again.
Disclosure: ARC received from Netgalley & publisher in exchange for an honest review. (They may regret this.) Any and all quotes were taken from an advanced edition subject to change in the final edition.
Summary gives me the vibe of [b:Burial Rites|17333319|Burial Rites|Hannah Kent|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1384207446s/17333319.jpg|21943144], which would definitely be a good thing.
After Reading...
Well if only it had given me the vibe of Burial Rites while I was reading it. Needless to say, it did not.
Perhaps I am simply not a fan of Nordic writing styles, or at least the Nordic writing style I seem to come across (like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo). This one reminded me of the aforementioned in that I failed to find the novel and writing appealing and I was left uninterested.
But regardless of my preference for writing styles, this book definitely had major flaws. I did not know if it was the author's first novel upon beginning it but I subsequently discovered it was and it was no surprise. The writing constantly reminded me of someone trying too hard to be clever or be noticed and ultimately failing to write an enjoyable novel.
The pacing in Wolf Winter was off and generally lacked a flowing style that made reading a bother. Statements were often odd and seemingly out of place, making you ponder what the hell the author was trying to convey, especially considering it often seemed out of context. POV changes occurred without indication, leaving the reader once again pondering. (As for the POV changes, there may have been page breaks etc. in the final product, but NetGalley's formatting was so poor I am unsure.)
But what ultimately made me abandon this book was the metaphors. Holy hell this book is heavy-handed with metaphors. And not just metaphors, but twisted and tortured metaphors that are oddly very specific and at times lengthy. The metaphors vacillated back and forth between poor and just plain distracting. Each page was weighed down with these metaphors that it made reading feel like a chore, a chore of digging through metaphors to find the little nuggets of info the author seemed to want to convey. Ultimately I chalk it up to a new author trying too hard.
I did not enjoy Wolf Winter and I would be unlikely to read the author again.
Disclosure: ARC received from Netgalley & publisher in exchange for an honest review. (They may regret this.) Any and all quotes were taken from an advanced edition subject to change in the final edition.
I really enjoyed this novel.
A different country, a different time, very different people. A touch of magic thrown in. Very slight, but there.
I think she did a wonderful job drawing such a variety of characters and showing events from each of their perspectives.
It is one of those "mystery" books that covers so much more: prejudice, poverty, racism, gender inequalities, the role of church in societies and communities, and yet even though the topics are difficult, even horrific, you enjoy spending time with the book.
A different country, a different time, very different people. A touch of magic thrown in. Very slight, but there.
I think she did a wonderful job drawing such a variety of characters and showing events from each of their perspectives.
It is one of those "mystery" books that covers so much more: prejudice, poverty, racism, gender inequalities, the role of church in societies and communities, and yet even though the topics are difficult, even horrific, you enjoy spending time with the book.