Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

Narrated by Lisa Flanagan

Synopsis (via Goodreads): Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders... but her father isn't a very good one. Free to lend and reluctant to collect, he has loaned out most of his wife's dowry and left the family on the edge of poverty--until Miryem steps in. Hardening her heart against her fellow villagers' pleas, she sets out to collect what is owed--and finds herself more than up to the task. When her grandfather loans her a pouch of silver pennies, she brings it back full of gold.

But having the reputation of being able to change silver to gold can be more trouble than it's worth--especially when her fate becomes tangled with the cold creatures that haunt the wood, and whose king has learned of her reputation and wants to exploit it for reasons Miryem cannot understand.

𑁋

I borrowed the audiobook for Spinning Silver from my library multiple times before I finally finished it. It wasn't that the story itself was bad, but the pacing was painfully slow. It was liking wading through a river with rocks in your pockets -- not impossible, but not pleasant either. I felt like it took the author a very long time to get from point A to point B, which resulted in a lack of interest on my part.

Additionally, the perspective changes periodically and without warning. The author doesn't specify who is speaking at the start of each chapter, so you're left trying to figure it out on your own. I will say that I didn't have too much trouble telling the characters apart, both because of the narrator and the drastic differences in the characters themselves, but it was always touch and go at the beginning. Sometimes I would start listening to a chapter thinking it was one person, only to rewind and start over once I realized it was someone else.

I really enjoyed the girl power in this book, and how the three women refused to accept or bend to the expectations of others. The father of one didn't want to harass people for the money they owed him, and his daughter was tired of seeing her family suffer because of it. She took over his business and made it profitable, simply by holding other people accountable. She didn't back down when they laughed at her, and she didn't accept their excuses. Another daughter was mistreated, both physically and verbally, yet she still managed to work towards a better future for herself and her siblings. She didn't let his words or his fists control her life or break her spirit. The third daughter is cloistered away because her father feels like she's unimportant. He doesn't think she has anything to offer the world, and only sees his dead wife whenever she's around. He wants to use her station as a means to improve his standing, and she manages is to twist it in her favor. These girls knew they were more than their circumstances, and they fought against the men that wanted to use and control them for their own personal gain. I thought their individual stories were compelling, and loved when their lives started overlapping and there were more interactions between them.

Naomi Novik is a very skilled writer, and the details in Spinning Silver were clever and vast. Everything is connected. A tree, a name, a forgotten house... all of the induvial threads were woven together until there was a big, beautiful tapestry at the end. I have no idea how the author managed to keep everything organized, because there was so much happening simultaneously. I would often disregarded details as inconsequential (just more padding for the story), only to later realize they were actually crucial to the continuation of the story. It was brilliant!

If you don't mind books with a slower pace, I would highly recommend this. The story itself is fantastic and I wish I had more patience for stories like this one. The characters were strong, intelligent, determined, and not afraid to fight for themselves. The setting was both lovely and eerie, and I enjoyed experiencing the world from multiple perspectives.