Reviews with content warning for Drug use - Winterkeep

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Winterkeep by Kristin Cashore

12 reviews

beary_bookwormish's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional inspiring tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

As always Miss Cashore spends a wonderful yarn. I love that her characters have a lot of depth and they are very human. It's a fantasy without it being too fantastical. The characters are very flawed.

The character Lavesa is extremely complicated. She has so many things going on and she is always trying to figure out something, about someone or something. Her mind is constantly in overdrive. Her journey is very different that's the best way to put it. I was really surprised about the promiscuity of the main character Lavesa she had no Scruples whatsoever which was surprising.

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lizziaha's review against another edition

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Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.75

I love the additions to the Graceling world in this book! I especially enjoyed the Keeper(?) perspective and the interactions with the silbercows. I also thought that Lovisa as a character was very complex, and it was refreshing to see a teen in YA acting like a teenager instead of a small adult. very excited to pick up the next installment!

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lubotomy's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? N/A
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

5.0

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talonsontypewriters's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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alizirrah's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

A bit disappointed and frustrated with this book, which I fully expected to be at least a 4-star read based on my enjoyment of the rest of this series. Unfortunately it was "just okay" overall - the prose itself flowed well and was generally pretty good, and there were a few moments I really enjoyed, but not enough to get past a lot of the worldbuilding and character motivation issues.

Things I did enjoy:

* Some of the world building was pretty cool! I liked the concept of the ambles, the description of the landscape, and the politics of the different airship fuel sources.

* Enjoyed getting more Giddon and Hava! Their parts were probably my favorite; I wish there was a bit more of it.

* The action, when it happened, was exciting. Like the escape from Lovisa's family home, and the fox figuring out how to help Bitterblue. Actually, Adventure Fox was one of my favorites too.

Here are some of the things that bothered me about this book:

* Why does it seem like all world exploration is happening during the main characters' lifetime, despite things like boats and apparently airships already being in existence? Bitterblue and Co. really didn't know the Dells or Winterkeep even existed, nor had anyone ever visited from those places, until just now? I repeat, there are AIRSHIPS.

* Apparently the language of the Middluns is called Lingian, after Gracelings. This is like if a country's language was named after like, a unique disease or mental health condition. But an outsider named their language. Did they not have a name for their own language before? What.

* Okay, so. Let's talk about race. The first couple of books only had white people and vaguely tan Lianid people. Sure. So in this book, the 4th in the series, you introduce a continent where everyone is dark-skinned/brown. Sure. They live in the far north, where it snows all the time and has glaciers. ...Pardon? (If this was the only worldbuilding issue, I'd shrug because I don't really care if having POC in particular settings "makes sense." Representation and diversity is a good thing. But it just feels like.. kind of a weird geographical choice, I don't know. The map in general has a clear "making this up as I go" vibe, especially with how squared off the Middluns are.)

* The blue foxes. Did you know they're not actually blue, they're gray? If you didn't know, you'll be told about 3 or 4 times. They definitely feel, hmm, a bit derivative of His Dark Materials daemons, though I do understand that Pullman's books don't have a monopoly on bonded animals that talk to you and spy on people. But honestly Lavisa's parents feel a lot like Lyra's parents, too. Down to the fur coats and traveling around on airships and uh, the abuse.

* Almost all of the characters have dialogue that has a shallow, slightly ditzy and childish vibe, to the point that I couldn't tell the difference in maturity between a 16 year old protagonist and the ones in their 20s or 30s.

* Characters have a... strange relationship with casual sex in this book. Don't get me wrong, I am 100% pro-casual sex if a person wants that. But what feels like a disproportionate amount of time is spent thinking about it compared to the actual plot. The way Bitterblue is like "oh yes, I have so many lovers but I don't actually care about any of them" doesn't really fit with how otherwise sensitive and empathetic she is. It at least makes more sense for Lovisa to kind of have a fucked up relationship with it, considering her upbringing and how manipulative the people around her are. There is also a very odd exchange where Nev asks her grandfather if he has "ever experienced sexual jealousy" and he's like, oh yeah, totally, your grandmother slept with lots of guys before me. (... Okay?) And then Lovisa leaves the room because it's making her feel weird/bad. There's really no point to this exchange other than that.

I feel a bit bad that this review is so negative, I really enjoy the Graceling series normally, but this one just wasn't it for me. Will I read Seasparrow? Upon reflection, even though I think it features Hava, who I do like... probably not. I think I'll stick with my nostalgia for the first book, as if it were a standalone.

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cepbreed's review

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adventurous dark emotional slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

I'M SO PROUD OF MYSELF I TOTALLY CALLED IT AFTER READING THE LAST BOOK!!!

Bitterblue and Giddon have my entire heart and each chapter of longing and want made me fall for them more. The pining was beautifully done and the set up in the last book, even if unintentional, made them an instant favorite of mine. Soulmates don't always need to find each other immediately they just need to have their "its always been you" moment.

God I love Cashore's ability to flesh out characters in her entirely unique way. Each interaction is purposeful, each conversation adds layers to the personal narratives of the characters involved, it's masterful. I've never felt so close to a character in a fantasy novel as I do with Lovisa. She is remarkable and vulnerable. Just that is enough to inspire me. Thank you Kristen Cashore for this series that I never thought I'd love so hard. I'd like to travel back in time and simultaneously punch and hug the person I was when I picked up the first book. She was naive in expressing a dislike for the series, but wise to continue on despite that initial opinion. I'll remember these books forever.

Ranking of the books: Bitterblue, Winterkeep, Fire, Graceling

Song:

Mirrorball - Taylor Swift

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miciahsreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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merenguita's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

There is something really intresting about setting up a mistry in a fantasy book like this author does in all of the series. In this particular book we get to discover a brand new world with new characters while still seeing some of the characters we know and love from previous books.
This is also true for the narrator, there are so many narrators! One of the first is Giddon and I honeslty didn't expect to like him that much, i always looked forward to his parts. I think his character arc flourishes in this installment and it's quite beautiful to see his sweetness.
As always there is some romance, although it's not the main plot and there are more intresting elements to the book. For exaple Lovisa and her family

specially once everything has unfolded and we can see the inner struggle, the conflict with her own identity and how, eventually, she takes her power back

The only thing I would add is that I hope we can see more LGBTQ+ relationships between the main characters at some point in the future

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saltydough's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

I've been reading the Graceling books since I was young, and I really enjoyed finding myself back in that world again. Kristin Cashore is undeniably a very good writer and creates carefully thought-through plots with lots of focus on the characters' thoughts and feelings. That being said, this is not my favorite or hers, which could also be down to the fact that I'm no longer within the target age range. I felt that the multiple POVs didn't work very well because she Cashore didn't change her writing style, or the character's thoughts, enough for each one to be distinctive. In such a character-focused story, switching from one to the other is almost counter-productive because we never stay in anyone's head long enough to feel truly connected to their POV. I was also a bit disappointed by Giddon and Bitterblue's romance. Though I think those characters do have chemistry when they're on the page together, it was annoying that when they were apart, every other sentence would be about how Bitterblue would've loved this or Giddin would've done that, and so on. I get that Cashore was trying to create that pining, but it just didn't work for me.

I do think this is a really fun and entertaining book, though, and I appreciated the allegory about climate change. Would recommend!

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darth_twain's review

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adventurous emotional sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

If you are a fan of other YA fantasy novels, then you will enjoy the story of this book. Be aware of adult content that is not appropriate for young readers. I enjoyed the story but will be throwing the book away before I have children of my own who could stumble across this book and read adult content slipped into a YA story.

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