east.

I got a lot of reading in while Sean was in Europe and I have been a huge slacker since he has been home. I am in the middle of reading The Remains of the Day and re-reading To Kill a Mockingbird, and I don't anticipate finishing anytime soon! So I thought I'd post about one of my favorite books; East by Edith Pattou. First, here is a short synopsis from Publishers Weekly:

Readers with a taste for fantasy and folklore will embrace Pattou's (Hero's Song) lushly rendered retelling of "East of the Sun and West of the Moon." In an old Norwegian village, a highly superstitious mother tries to protect her youngest child, Rose, from a dire prophecy; as the various characters take turns narrating the story, it is readily apparent that no one else takes the superstitions seriously. Nevertheless, Rose is "different" in many ways, from her purple eyes to her passion for weaving, which leads her to make a cloak patterned with a "wind rose" (a mapmaker's symbol indicating the direction of the winds)She also seems to attract the attention of a white bear, and when the bear finally approaches her, offering to make her poor family prosper and to restore her ill sister's health if Rose will come away with him, she finds the offer impossible to resist. Pattou unfolds her story slowly and carefully, luring readers across many miles with the brave and determined Rose. Handsomely evoking a landscape filled with castles, trolls, shamans and spellbound princes, the story will exercise its audience's imagination.

I read this on vacation and could not put it down. The story is fabulously written. It was truly magical to read. Kind of like reading the first Harry Potter for the first time. I've heard a few people say that they felt the end was a little anti-climatic, but I was totally satisfied with the whole book. Romance+Fantasy= good reading in Ariel's opinion :) I give it 5 stars.