Spinning Silver
A rich and enchanting fairytale retelling from the author of Uprooted
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- 5,99 €
Publisher Description
Will dark magic claim their home?
Rumours have drawn unexpected attention – and now her life hangs in the balance. From the author of the award-winning Uprooted, Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver is a rich, original tale inspired by the folktale of Rumpelstiltskin.
‘Dire and wonderful; I loved this book so much’ – Laini Taylor, author of Strange the Dreamer
Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father is too kind-hearted to collect his debts. They face poverty, until Miryem hardens her own heart and takes up his work in their village.
Her success creates a rumour that she can turn silver into gold, attracting the fairy king of winter himself. He sets her an impossible challenge – and if she fails, she will die. Yet if she triumphs, it may mean a fate worse than death. And, in her desperate efforts to succeed, Miryem unwittingly spins a web which draws in the unhappy daughter of a lord . . .
Irina’s father schemes to wed her to the tsar – he will pay any price to achieve this goal. However, the dashing tsar is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of mortals and winter alike.
‘Pits the cold of endless winter against the fires of duty, love and sacrifice. I couldn’t put it down’ – Katherine Arden, author of The Bear and the Nightingale
‘Naomi Novik knows how to weave words into magic, and Spinning Silver enchants the reader from the first page’ – Christina Henry, author of Alice
‘I’m in awe of how Novik spins moldy, hateful straw into warm and glimmering gold’ – Amal El-Mohtar, author of This is How You Lose the Time War
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This gorgeous, complex, and magical novel, grounded in Germanic, Russian, and Jewish folklore but richly overlaid with a cohesive, creative story of its own, rises well above a mere modern re-imagining of classic tales. Novik (Uprooted) begins the story through the eyes of Miryem, a Jewish moneylender's daughter, whose pride in her ability to wring payments from borrowers draws the demanding attention of the terrifying, otherworldly, and rules-bound Staryk, who are ruled by a wintry, gold-loving king. Secondary characters a peasant boy, a duke's daughter, a tsar eventually become narrators, weaving interconnections that feel simultaneously intimate and mythic. Novik probes the edges between the everyday and the extraordinary, balancing moods of wonder and of inevitability. Her work inspires deep musings about love, wealth, and commitment, and embodies the best of the timeless fairy-tale aesthetic. Readers will be impressed by the way Novik ties the myriad threads of her story together by the end, and, despite the book's length, they will be sad to walk away from its deeply immersive setting. This is the kind of book that one might wish to inhabit forever.
