THE WINTER FOLK
JEN JULIAN
Run For It (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$9.99 ebook, available now
Rating: 4.5* of five
The Publisher Says: A woman returns to the mysterious lodge in the woods where she once worked, and to the inscrutable creature that bound her there, in this haunting Appalachian gothic horror from singular voice Jen Julian. Perfect for fans of Alix E. Harrow and T. Kingfisher.
This is the story of Moth, who earned her name working for the Winter Folk.
Every year, the Winter Folk gather at a secret lodge in the Appalachians, a place known as Deerhaven, refuge for the time-worn and weary. As a child, Moth heard warnings from her mother: They are heartless, wild creatures—and they got no concern of us. At twenty-one, Moth is a college dropout, indebted, impoverished, and desperate for better things. She falls instantly for Deerhaven’s beautiful antlered host, the mild-mannered Mr. Oslin. When he offers her a housekeeper’s contract—one wish granted for a winter of service—she signs without question.
But Deerhaven is a dangerous place. Staff must follow strict rules or else face dire consequences, and the guests can be unpredictable and savage. And yet, Moth endures, enticed by a rumor that Mr. Oslin is looking for a protégé. A singular worker who would stay with him forever and be transformed.
Decades later, Moth returns to Appalachia with her husband and teenage daughter. She can't shake the feeling that she needs to return to Deerhaven, which banished her twenty years ago. As she hunts for a way in, her haunting memories and harrowing experiences come roaring back—her friends and rivals, her growing obsession with Mr. Oslin, and her mysterious exile.
A door exists in the dark of the woods. After so long away, what has Deerhaven become?
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.
My Review: In fiction, one must always have a fine balace between questions answered, questions unanswered, and unanswerable problems. Without something in the story that feels...unfinished, there's no place for the reader to put their own experiences onto the read. If there are unanswered questions, things the author sets up as needing reolution that aren't resolved, they'd best be finely calculated to invite a sequel. My ur-text for doing this balancing act well is Lord of the Rings. Yes, *I* said something noce about a story I really disliked reading. It left the Problem of Evil unresolved, as indeed is reality's unresolved Big Question; but the plot-driving questions? All resolved to varying degrees of finality. It is genius storytelling. (I still hate it, but credit where it's due.)
On the other end is A Song of Ice and Fire. I don't feel the need to elaborate. Trillions of pixels arranged in uncountable patterns are out there reflecting fans' emotional responses to an incomplete story. Fans are still spouting off about the various issues, the creator is not doing much to calm them down, so on the noise goes.
Here's a story, with a fundamentally unresolvable conflict underpinning it, resolvable conflicts skinned over it, and some left-unfinished business that invites a sequel or two, that doesn't quite scale heights of genius but does plant the author's story-flag atop a hill.
The setting is Appalachia, which is US-cultural shorthand for "the Shire," that pre- or de-industrial landscape of natural beauty, peopled by rustics, rife with quaint folk who *indulgent smile* accept magic is real. I find that more than mildly insulting acceped as a storytelling given, but it's there, it works, and it's not factually incorrect just because it's insulting. It is not used condescendingly in Author Jen Julian's hands, so I'm not bristling at her, but at the stereotyping that allows this perception to go unchallenged.
Author Julian's story of Moth's life lived in two mutually exclusive worlds, magical and mundane, is one she could not have told as well absent this stereotype. Moth will always be Moth despite being born Vera. Think a moment about the root of the name "Vera," and her destiny is unlocked. (Go read, I'm going to assume you got the point and move on.) Moth is, and isn't, Vera. Like all those who are transformed by contact with magic, the life Moth leads after her time in Deerhaven is much like the lives lead by post-Garden Adam and Eve. She knows now what it costs to See Beyond (caps very intentional for context) when Vision is...removed, denied, forbidden...after being granted. How she will always, always have Heimweh for a state of being that can only exist in a place that is inaccessible now you've left it.
Don't put too much weight on Vera's last name being "Stoker." It can best be seen as a marker of her otherness and not as an invitation to horror and bloody violence. Moth, being returned to "Vera" and mundanity, can't stop being aware of her lack, loss, denied state. It's achieved by very unshowy means, in word choices for Moth and later for Vera that convey different emotional registers. It's not something that will hit you in the face but a dawning awareness, a thing that stays just outside your field of vision until you see it then you don't unsee it as it organizes the read anew.
Vera and Moth belong to different worlds. They have some memories in common; they know a few of the same people and carry some of the same baggage from bruising, painful shifts in their life; but in the end Vera can only be Vera or Moth in those lives, in those mutually exclusive worlds.
Do you need a better explanation for the experience of growth as a person?
It's a read I can see taking on a life bigger than its basis if and when the zeitgeist aligns with it. I hope for Author Julian's sake that happens now, propelling her into prominence she has the talent to support. I seriously hope she has or acquires the skills to survive it.
