The Queen in Winter (The Kiss of the Snow Queen / A Whisper of Spring / A Gift of Wings / When Winter Comes)

Four novellas by Claire Delacroix, Lynn Kurland, Sharon Shinn and Sarah Monette.

I found this collection to be a bit of a mixed bag. I enjoyed two of the stories very much, but the others did almost nothing for me.

I think my preferences here are divided along genre lines. The two stories that didn't click seemed, to me, to be rooted quite firmly in the romance genre. I haven't read a great deal of romance, but the few such novels I've been exposed to were mostly surface and little depth. The stories - "A Whisper of Spring" by Lynn Kurland and "The Kiss of the Snow Queen" by Claire Delacroix - fit the bill. We're told a lot of things, but at no point do the authors show us enough that we can really feel it. A lot happens in the show more background, and in many cases it seems as though each author has simply padded her story to make it fit a predetermined word count. They were disappointing. I did find it interesting that Delacroix chose to rework the Snow Queen myth, with some interesting inclusions, but I never felt that she really hit the mark. I'd give each of these stories somewhere between two and a half and three stars. They weren't bad, but they're nothing I'll feel the need to return to.

The other two stories - "When Winter Comes" by Sharon Shinn and "A Gift of Wings" by Sarah Monette - owe much more to the fantasy genre. The romance is decidedly understated in Shinn's story; she focuses on the main character's struggle to help her sister and her nephew lead a normal life. Each scene adds more to what we know about these two women and their difficulties. I enjoyed it quite a bit, and am looking forward to reading more of Shinn's work. I understand that this story ties into her series that begins with Mystic and Rider; perhaps I'll start there.

Monette's story is the reason I purchased the collection, and it was worth the price of admission. If I'd hated every other story, I'd still keep the book for this one alone. I just love the way this woman writes! She's got style aplenty; I sank straight into the story and didn't come up for air until I'd finished the last word. The atmosphere is just gorgeous, the world building is tops, and the relationship between the protagonist and her lover felt real. I'm very, very glad to have read it. While it's set in the same world as her series that begins with Melusine, it has no connection to that story.

I can't really recommend the stories by Kurland and Delacroix, but this is worth seeking out for the contributions from Shinn and Monette. show less

This was a little collection of short fantasy/romance stories, by 4 women writers, that I picked up at the library book sale. I had never tried any of the authors before, so I thought it would be a fun experiment.

And it was fun. The first story, A Whisper of Spring, was by Lynn Kurland and it was a tale of a kidnapped elven princess and a wizard human prince who goes to rescue her. Nothing especially deep, but I just loved it. I liked the characters and the storytelling itself. I wish it had been longer, because I really wanted to read more about the characters.

The only story I wasn't especially happy with was the one by Claire Delacroix, a twist on the Snow Queen story that didn't really fit in with either the collection or the fairy show more tale itself.

But as always, part of the fun in a collection like this is that you discover some new authors - ones you like, ones you don't - and everyone else has a different opinion about it. I will look for more by Kurland and by Sharon Shinn. show less

I think this would've got a worse rating from me if not for Monette's story (or even if Monette's hadn't been the last one). Mild spoilers follow, but how can you discuss a short story without them?

Lynn Kurland's "A Whisper of Spring" was fine. It was a bit of a romp love story between a human and a fairy. I was pleased that she was active in her rescue and didn't sit around wailing while the men did all the work. However, the flashbacks of the two first seeing each other were rather irritating. Could we have a little more substance than "shiny!"?

Sharon Shinn's "When Winter Comes" was pretty good. Aside from not seeing too much chemistry between the main characters, it told a pretty good story. I found the religious persecution pretty show more tired. The story of intolerance is an important one to tell, but if it's told often enough and same enough to be almost cliché, does it have any power any more?

Claire Delacroix's "The Kiss of the Snow Queen" had some troublesome things going on: the maiden told to protect her chastity to keep her power, the mysterious helper with a bit of a sex fixation, the powerful sorceror who saw a pretty woman and said, "baby, I'ma make you mine!", and a bad bad woman (you can tell because she's cold). *sigh* On the other hand, the mysterious helper was kind of nifty. He helped OH strengthen herself so that he could use her to achieve his goal. I don't mind that: you make your weapon strong and true; you don't mistreat it. However, the memory trick irks me something fierce. It's a giant takeback and I want people to stop doing it.

Sarah Monette's "A Gift of Wings" is Sarah Monette doing what she does. I was a little "sigh" over yet another damaged man. However, the damage wasn't suddenly cured by LOVE. Love played its part but didn't work miracles. Agido (Our Heroine) is pleasantly active. She's in danger, but she works to get out of it. She doesn't wait for a man to rescue her. Also, bonus points for older heroine who knows the value of sex for fun. show less

This takes place before Lothar became the big bad for the world. He is just starting out and he wants a wife. So he kidnaps the beautiful elven princess Iolaire. Luckly for her the king of the newly made kingdom of Neroche has been in love with her for years. It was a lot of fun to see the beginnings of the main bad guy and how Neroche was founded. Lothar is really just a background presence but he does it well. Symon is great, I really like him. He is a bad place because Lothar is his older brother but he is going bad. Iolaire is not bad I would have liked to see of her before she was kidnapped. A good addition to the Nine Kingdoms lore.

I give this novella a Five out of Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book show more from my local library. show less

The four stars are for the two novellas I liked, the one by Sarah Monette and the one by Sharon Shinn. The Sharon Shinn novella is set in her Mystic and Rider universe and was mostly enjoyable because it was fun to spend more time with some of the minor characters from that series. The Sarah Monette story was clever and excellent, as is to be expected from Sarah Monette.

The other two novellas were not at all to my taste, and would each merit 2 stars from me. (One I finished, since I got halfway through and it felt like a waste to give up on it. The other I quit after just a few pages.)

Improbable versions of fairy story girl gets guy - Mixing the Fall and the Ice Queen and Skaldi foot searching for her preferred groom. Sarah Monette’s story was pretty straight mystery romance, even if the victim went for boys. Kurland’s lovers are all perfectly lovely, and Shinn describes a prosperous 19-20th century domestic architecture for a medieval technology tale. Separate bedrooms and squeezing bedsteads?

Four stories in the book by four different authors, so the quality is a bit uneven. Each has some element of fantasy--elves, or special powers, or fairy tale, or magic. The first story is a more traditional romance story, with the man coming to the rescue of a damsel in distress. The second was quite slow but had an interesting premise; less traditional love story, and more a slow progression of events. The third story is a retelling of the Snow Queen fairy tale. I'm not generally a fan of this sort of thing, and this retelling didn't change my mind. The mixing of gods/religions and the lack of clarity in the beginning of the story was unfortunate. Out of them all, I enjoyed the fourth story the most. It is the shortest, and also a bit show more unclear about the details of the world at first, but it's a neat little story about a murder and how people often need to rely on others. show less