Russian Along

[mtvessel]

Apr 2020
The Girl in the Tower - Katherine Arden – Del Rey, 2017
* * * *
In my review of the The Bear and the Nightingale, I praised the depiction of mediaeval Russian politics and village life but was less enamoured by the invented folk tale elements. Pleasingly, Arden has leaned into the former and downplayed the latter in this second volume, making for a more grounded and interesting story. But it has revealed a mismatch between the setting and the protagonist which may be a problem.

It's clear that Arden has gained confidence in her descriptive powers, because the setting is no longer a small village but Moscow itself. We initially see it through the eyes of two characters who were bundled off early in the previous book - Princess Olga, who rules her terem (women's quarters) and who is expecting her third child with her absentee husband Prince Serpukhov; and her brother Sasha, a warrior-priest who returns to Moscow to report the razing of a number of villages. Sasha accompanies his cousin Dimitrii, the young, energetic Crown Prince of Moscow, as they attempt to track down the bandits responsible. They eventually do so with the help of two people; a red-headed boyar called Kasyan Lutovich, and a dashing young man with an amazing horse, whom Sasha, to his horror, realises is his sister Vasilia in a most unmaidenly disguise.

The reason for this, as we quickly learn, is that Vasilia has gone off to see the world with the assistance of her love interest Morozhko the frost demon and her magic horse, Solovey, and this is where Arden's desire to present a realistic mediaeval Russia collides somewhat with her more modern heroine. For as the depiction of Olga's life makes clear, opportunities for women were extremely limited. They were expected to stay in their own quarters and bring up children for their husbands. Vasilia rightly resists such a fate but this forces Arden into the heavily overused cliche of a woman dressed as a man and living in close proximity to men without a single one of them noticing. This trope is fine for Shakespearian comedies and Terry Pratchett, but in a book with a more serious tone I find it somewhat implausible (although of course there are historical and literary precedents). It doesn't help that Vasilia behaves in some deeply stupid and dangerous ways for someone who is supposed to be lying low, as her brother and sister both point out. That said, I prefer that story thread to her love affair with Morozhko, which absolutely does not work for me.

Despite the flaws this is still a fun read - the depiction of mediaeval Moscow is great and it's hard to take against such a spirited heroine. It's unusual for the middle volume of a trilogy to be the best one, but I suspect that could be the case here.