“She was never a hothouse flower. She is a sturdy oak tree. If her leaves have fallen, then she will bloom again come spring. She was not ready to die when she gave her life to me. But she did anyway, because she loved, and loved deeply.”
I went into this book with high expectations….and those expectations we’re blown away entirely with the magnitude of this story. It was phenomenal. This book truly resonated with me. It’s rustic, atmospheric quality compared with it’s whimsical plot and even more estranged characters made for an epic fantasy like none other I’ve read in a long time. Fans of Uprooted by Naomi Novik will appreciate the eerie personification that nature plays in this tale. What felt like a folkloric retelling but was actually an original, genuine piece of literature, Wintersong follows a young girl as she rediscovers her childhood self through love, responsibility, and sacrifice… all while doing so beneath silt and soil of the Earth.
Nineteen-year-old Innkeeper’s daughter Liesl has grown up in a sleepy village on the boarders between woodlands and Bavaria. While her younger sister is being groomed for marriage, and her brother preparing for an upcoming apprenticeship with a renowned composer, Elisabeth is constantly fussing over the wellbeing and success of her siblings. The only time she allots for herself is to revel in her passion— composing music of her own dark, melancholy nature. As a child, Liesl would roam deep into the Goblin Grove and play for the Goblin King—luring him out from beneath the earth to sing and dance and revel with her. But as time passes, Liesl’s fiery nature fades into the recesses of her soul. She focuses on everyone else around her but herself. It isn’t until her sister, Käthe, is stolen by the Goblin King to be his bride that our protagonist is drawn from her grey stupor and thrown back into the world of spellbinding fantasy. But Elisabeth has known all this time that no fantasy comes without a price, and her childhood adventures with Der Elkönig, The Goblin King, won’t compare to the game she is about to partake in. Elusive, powerful, and ferocious, Wintersong is a book that forces you to read it in two sittings or less.
