Monday, August 27, 2018

2018 book 130

Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver
I loved this so much when I first read it that I made book club read it as soon as possible just so I could reread it. And even having read it before, it's still the sort of story that just hooks you and you sink right into it. I like that Novik centered this in a (more or less) specific place and time in history, unlike the vague Eastern European forest of Uprooted, because making it explicitly about Jews in Lithuania in the pre-war years adds a large chunk of verisimilitude. Anyway, the story itself is a sort of take on Rumplestiltskin, focusing on the Jewish daughter of a moneylender who says she can turn silver into gold . . . and then the local gold-stealing fairies come for her. There are several other POV characters, primarily women struggling to make the best of their limited options, but also a couple of interesting males, who help round out the story. Anyway, I love this, it makes me cry, it’s awesome, great ladies, etc etc, A.

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