While Vasya accepts them as a part of her world and befriends them, her frightened stepmother does all that she can to avoid them.

Like Vasya, Anna has the second sight, which allows her to see the domovoi and other spirits. He travels to Moscow in search of a wife and returns wed to another Grand Prince’s daughter, a religious young woman named Anna who had hoped to spend the rest of her days in a convent: for only within the walls of a church can she hide from the devils. However, after six-year-old Vasya becomes lost in the woods and is found insisting that she saw a gnarled old tree and a one-eyed man that are nowhere to be found, one of her older brothers convinces their father that a wild girl like she must have a mother. Vasya’s mother does not survive childbirth, and for years, the grieving lord never so much as thinks of remarrying. When she tells her husband the news, she also tells him that their next child will be a girl with the gifts of her own mother, a mysterious woman whose grace and beauty captured the heart and hand of the Grand Prince of Moscow-and who was rumored to be a witch.

Though The Bear and the Nightingale is primarily Vasilisa’s story, it begins before her birth, soon after her mother realizes a fifth child will be joining their family. This phenomenal book has made quite a mark since its publication early this year: it was a Goodreads Choice Award finalist in both the Best Fantasy and Debut Author categories, Amazon selected it as the best science fiction and fantasy book of 2017, and it has begun appearing on numerous best of the year lists (which I am confident will include my own since, even though very little of 2017 is left, it’s still one of my two favorite new releases!). The Bear and the Nightingale, Katherine Arden’s debut novel and the first book in the Winternight trilogy, is Slavic-folklore-inspired historical fantasy set in northern Rus’ during the fourteenth century.

The bear and the nightingale trilogy