For Parents and Educators FAQs

The Winternight Trilogy is set in historical Muscovy during the latter half of the fourteenth century. It follows the adventures of a young woman named Vasilisa Petrovna (Vasya) who has the ability to see and speak with the spirits of East Slavic folklore. It combines real history and historical characters with Slavic myths, legends, and folktales.

My first book was The Bear and the Nightingale, the first book in the Winternight Trilogy. I began it in 2011, and it was published in 2017. The final book of the Winternight Trilogy, The Winter of the Witch, came out in 2019. 

I graduated from college in 2011 with plans to go to grad school for linguistics or interpretation. (I got my undergraduate degree in French and Russian) However, I decided to take six months off to work on a farm in Hawaii (first on the Big Island, then on Maui). While there, bored, I decided to begin a novel to entertain myself. I had always loved books based on fairy tales, but I had never read a book based on a Russian fairy tale. I had spent two years in Moscow, spoke Russian, and had read lots and lots of Russian fairy tales, so I picked my favorite fairy tale (the story of Morozko, or King Frost) and sort of trial and erred my way to my first book. Two more followed. 

The Kyivan Rus were conquered in the twelfth century by the descendants of Genghis Khan, when Kyiv was the center of East Slavic civilization and Moscow was a remote trading post. After two hundred years, the Mongols were still in charge, working with loyal princes to keep a thumb on the population, notably the princes of Moscow, who had grown powerful through collaboration with the invader. So powerful, in fact, that by the mid-fourteenth century, Dmitrii Ivanovich, Grand Prince of Moscow, was able to create alliances with the scattered princes of Rus’ to attempt to overthrow the golden horde and restore the East Slavs to self rule. This is a very basic summary of the historical environment that underpins the Winternight Trilogy. 

The series draws on a wide variety of folk tales, and legends. Each of the three novels has a ‘main’ fairy tale that is retold within the text. ‘Morozko’ in book 1, ‘The Snow Maiden’ in book 2 and ‘Marya Morevna’ in book 3 plus many fairy tales that are alluded to or referenced. The books also feature a wide variety of folkloric characters including Slavic household spirits like the domovoi, bannik and vazila and wild forest guardians like the rusalka and leshy, plus more powerful characters like Lady Midnight (Polunochnitsa) and Morozko, the Winter king.

I don’t think so. I’ve thought about what might happen next, but I was generally pleased with how the trilogy ended and am reluctant to reopen the question by adding to the story.

My next project is a speculative historical novel, standalone not a series. It is set during the last year of World War I.  Titled The Warm Hands of Ghosts, it will be out in February 2024

My favorite things are growing flowers (we also grow vegetables but I love flowers more) reading, hiking, and skiing.