Booking through Thursday: Wintry Settings...

[fajrdrako]

From December 25, 2008: What I want to know today is … what are the most "wintery" books you can think of? The ones that almost embody Winter?

1. The Ringed Castle by Dorothy Dunnett. Set in Russia in the time of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, most of the action seems to take place in winter: sledges, a Winter Palace with an aviary in it, and lots of snow.
   
   
2. Ice Station Zebra by Alistair MacLean. I read it as a teen and the images of cold and snow stayed with me.
   
   
3. Dr. Jerri Nielsen: Cheating Death in Antarctica by Scott P. Werther. About living through a winter in Antarctica - with cancer.
   
   
4. A Game of Thrones, fantasy by George R.R. Martin. The first volume of A Song of Ice and Fire. Much of it is about the Stark family, who live in the far north (but south of the Wall), whose motto is, "Winter is coming."
   
   
5. Cagebird by Karin Lowachee, which I mention mostly just because I loved it so much. It begins in a prison in Greenland in winter.

Comments

[idiotgrrl.livejournal.com]

How about the scenes in "Left Hand of Darkness" where Estraven breaks the Envoy out of the gulag and they push a hand-sledge over the north pole and home? Brrr....

[flautopiccolo.livejournal.com]

I was thinking of that one, too.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

That was a beautiful book.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes - that was rather magnificent.

[filkferengi]

There's always Alan Dean Foster's Icerigger trilogy.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Alan Dean Foster's Icerigger trilogy

I haven't read it. I think I started reading one of his books once, got bored, and stopped. He used Esperanto for his background, if I remember correctly - ?

[filkferengi]

He's done lots of different series & stand-alones over the years. His stories are generally pretty good. Not Bujold-quality, but a good afternoon's read. He's better at action & plot the way Asimov is better at ideas.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

That sounds promising.

I've always found Asimov close to unreadable, though some of his non-fiction is fun.

[filkferengi]

His short [and short-short] stories tend to be better, distilling the story down to the idea, which is what he's better at anyway.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I dimly remember reading an Asimov story that was less than a page long, and it was good.

Don't remember it now though, and it might have been by someone else.

See why I don't usually read SF?