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chaptersofmads 's review for:
Winter by Winter
by Jordan Stratford
slow-paced
ARC provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.
Well, this was... something.
I'll start by saying that it's very obvious the author cares about Norse mythology, and did his best to do it justice. I know very little about viking culture so I won't comment on that aspect, but from what I could tell, it was well done.
As for, literally everything else, I'm not quite sure what to say or how to put my feelings into words. The book was too short, and yet it was the longest 120 pages I've ever read. There was action on nearly every page, and yet I had to fight to stay engaged. The writing style was so extremely odd that it gave the story itself a very disjointed feeling.
Ladda was an extremely passionate, fierce protagonist that should have inspired me to care about the story as well. And yet, I could never find myself sharing her passions because she moved on so quickly. Her affairs are meant to be all-consuming, yet they are forgotten nearly two paragraphs later. How is anyone supposed to believe you truly loved someone if the second something changes, you're in the arms of another man? I believe this was an attempt to make Ladda a strong, independent woman, but to me it just made her appear callous and flippant.
I'll also add that this would have worked better as an adult book. Especially with the marriages and affairs and even just the discussions of politics. Maybe my opinion would have been different had the story been given more time, more space to breathe. Perhaps I would have understood why Ladda moved on so quickly if her relationships with others and the world around her hadn't been rushed quite so much.
As it stands, the whole book reads like a dream sequence from a movie, with fragments of a life lived and only hints at information and emotions that should be important to the viewer/reader.
Well, this was... something.
I'll start by saying that it's very obvious the author cares about Norse mythology, and did his best to do it justice. I know very little about viking culture so I won't comment on that aspect, but from what I could tell, it was well done.
As for, literally everything else, I'm not quite sure what to say or how to put my feelings into words. The book was too short, and yet it was the longest 120 pages I've ever read. There was action on nearly every page, and yet I had to fight to stay engaged. The writing style was so extremely odd that it gave the story itself a very disjointed feeling.
Ladda was an extremely passionate, fierce protagonist that should have inspired me to care about the story as well. And yet, I could never find myself sharing her passions because she moved on so quickly. Her affairs are meant to be all-consuming, yet they are forgotten nearly two paragraphs later. How is anyone supposed to believe you truly loved someone if the second something changes, you're in the arms of another man? I believe this was an attempt to make Ladda a strong, independent woman, but to me it just made her appear callous and flippant.
I'll also add that this would have worked better as an adult book. Especially with the marriages and affairs and even just the discussions of politics. Maybe my opinion would have been different had the story been given more time, more space to breathe. Perhaps I would have understood why Ladda moved on so quickly if her relationships with others and the world around her hadn't been rushed quite so much.
As it stands, the whole book reads like a dream sequence from a movie, with fragments of a life lived and only hints at information and emotions that should be important to the viewer/reader.