A review by bookaquarius
The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

adventurous dark slow-paced

Something about hearing a book be described as “painfully slow” makes me want to tune in. And it has paid off on multiple occasions! I finished The Bear and the Nightingale and I really enjoyed it. It was a wintery, atmospheric, Russian inspired, fairy tale-esque story and centers around a protagonist who has never quite been usual or willing to conform to expectations. And I suppose it’s slow as well! But at only 320 pages it zoomed by to me. I loved reading about all the weird creatures that inhabited this setting and seeing Vasya—the protagonist—defy expectations. There is definitely some cristicism of Christianity in this book but I wonder if it could or will go further in the future? Vasya also seemed to be the only person who saw what a trap women are living in and I want to see that explored more in the next books. At one point one of her (many) brothers said something to the effect of, “Vasya all the awful things you listed are just how it is for women.” Like, oh boy are you so close to a point!! The human villains were definitely irritating (the priest is creeeepy), and the non-human ones were a bit vague. I don’t know if their motivations were explored clearly enough here in this first book, but it also could be symptom of the fairy tale nature of the story that they don’t really need deeper motivations than being an evil-doer. 

It’s was a perfect late December read for me and I do want to pick up the rest of the series.