Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

Amy  

fantasy

Spinning Silver is outstanding epic fantasy tale featuring THREE strong, smart, and brave female leads! All are ordinary and must become extraordinary to improve their situations.  Miryem has been living in poverty even though her father, the money lender, should have been collecting money from his borrowers to keep his family comfortable.  She takes matters into her own hands and turns things around for her family.  Wanda’s father is one of the borrowers and she is sent to work for Miryem’s family as a form of payment.  She works hard to pay her family’s debt and decides to take measures to be able to determine her own destiny instead of allowing her father to marry her off to someone not of her choosing.  Irina, a duke’s daughter, has been married off to the Czar only to find out that he is possessed by a demon who wants to kill her and her family.  In an effort to save herself, her family, and the duchy, she finds a way to hold off the demon. Miryem’s, Wanda’s, and Irina’s paths intersect and they are able to work together for a time at a common goal before each landing in a place of their own choosing.

I adored getting to know every character in this novel. They were all so real and most were endearing.  I was spellbound!  The story is told mostly by the three young ladies but we also get the points of view from a few other characters.  I thought it was very well done and I couldn’t wait to find out what would happen next.  The magic was fun and the story was very creative. The settings were really well-drawn and I could easily picture all the different locations.  The novel cherished mothers (both birth and adopted) and respected multiple cultures (both real and imagined). This is the second novel by Naomi Novik that I've read and this is my favorite so far.

The narrator of the audiobook, Lisa Flanagan, was a good voice actor but she did not do a good job at giving the three leading ladies individual voices. Sometimes, there wasn’t enough of a break to even realize that we’d changed points of view which was confusing and annoying. She did a better job with some of the other characters’ voices but it wasn’t enough to make up for not distinguishing the leads enough. I give her a B+.