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Winter Rose #2
Solstice Wood
The World Fantasy Award-winning author's foray into the modern world-now in paperback.
No stranger to the realms of myth and magic, World Fantasy Award-winning author Patricia A. McKillip presents her first contemporary fantasy in many years-a tale of the tangled lives mere mortals lead, when they turn their eyes from the beauty and mystery that lie just outside of the everyday...
When bookstore owner Sylvia Lynn returns to her childhood home in upstate New York, she meets the Fiber Guild-a group of local women who meet to knit, embroider, and sew-and learns why her grandmother watches her so closely. A primitive power exists in the forest, a force the Fiber Guild seeks to bind in its stitches and weavings. And Sylvia is no stranger to the woods
No stranger to the realms of myth and magic, World Fantasy Award-winning author Patricia A. McKillip presents her first contemporary fantasy in many years-a tale of the tangled lives mere mortals lead, when they turn their eyes from the beauty and mystery that lie just outside of the everyday...
When bookstore owner Sylvia Lynn returns to her childhood home in upstate New York, she meets the Fiber Guild-a group of local women who meet to knit, embroider, and sew-and learns why her grandmother watches her so closely. A primitive power exists in the forest, a force the Fiber Guild seeks to bind in its stitches and weavings. And Sylvia is no stranger to the woods
278 pages, Paperback
First published January 26, 2006
About the author
Patricia A. McKillip
93 books3,072 followersPatricia Anne McKillip was an American author of fantasy and science fiction. She wrote predominantly standalone fantasy novels and has been called "one of the most accomplished prose stylists in the fantasy genre". Her work won many awards, including the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2008.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 181 reviews
December 28, 2016
Well, this was a lovely book. Standing on the fine line between our world and the land of faerie, a home and its guardians sew confines on all the potential crossing points, expecting protection but actually walling themselves in as well as the enchantment out. A story of family and magic and hot fae in the woods.
It was optimistic and soothing and full of fiber arts, a particular love of mine. Crocheting spells to weave magic boundaries? A coven built on yarn and fellowship? Yes, please and thank you.
It's a gentle story of hope and growth and I am thrilled to realize there is a prequel, that I must now go find.
It was optimistic and soothing and full of fiber arts, a particular love of mine. Crocheting spells to weave magic boundaries? A coven built on yarn and fellowship? Yes, please and thank you.
It's a gentle story of hope and growth and I am thrilled to realize there is a prequel, that I must now go find.
June 11, 2010
This is my second time reading this, which is a sequel to Winter Rose. The first time, I hadn't read Winter Rose in a couple of years and so couldn't directly compare them, and I felt as though Solstice Wood stood up reasonably well.
This time, I read them back to back, and oh dear, I thought Winter Rose was much better and didn't like Solstice Wood as much.
The problem, I think, is the disjunct between the styles and the settings. They're both first person, but Winter Rose has only one narrator, while Solstice Wood has five. McKillip distinguishes their voices well, so I never lost track of who was speaking, but at the same time, I never got to know any of them as well as I did Rois in Winter Rose.
Winter Rose feels as though it's very much not set in our world, but in a fantasy world McKillip has created. Solstice Wood is very firmly set in upstate New York, and so reading it back to back made the setting not work for me at all. I just could not reconcile the two totally different settings in a way that made it believable that one had become the other, even though years later.
As a book on its own, Solstice Wood is an interesting look at how a community might deal with having another world in its woods. As a sequel, though, it simply doesn't live up to its predecessor.
[ETA: edited 4/6/13 to fix idiotic author last name mistake.]
This time, I read them back to back, and oh dear, I thought Winter Rose was much better and didn't like Solstice Wood as much.
The problem, I think, is the disjunct between the styles and the settings. They're both first person, but Winter Rose has only one narrator, while Solstice Wood has five. McKillip distinguishes their voices well, so I never lost track of who was speaking, but at the same time, I never got to know any of them as well as I did Rois in Winter Rose.
Winter Rose feels as though it's very much not set in our world, but in a fantasy world McKillip has created. Solstice Wood is very firmly set in upstate New York, and so reading it back to back made the setting not work for me at all. I just could not reconcile the two totally different settings in a way that made it believable that one had become the other, even though years later.
As a book on its own, Solstice Wood is an interesting look at how a community might deal with having another world in its woods. As a sequel, though, it simply doesn't live up to its predecessor.
[ETA: edited 4/6/13 to fix idiotic author last name mistake.]
July 28, 2007
The one where Sylvia's grandfather dies and her grandmother calls her home to a house that's a gate between two worlds.
There's the germ of something wonderful here, and it all clusters around Iris, the grandmother, and her Fiber Guild. Everything in Iris' POV, everything about the Fiber Guild, I loved. The changeling was also wonderful, with a truly alien mind. But I can't recommend this one.
Part of the problem was the plot's dependence on things I just didn't believe. The human antagonist was completely laughable; I never bought his threats for a moment. And the plot required that the obvious answer to Sylvia's parentage never occur to Iris, which I also didn't believe.
Second, it was awfully tell-y -- people spent an awful lot of time telling each other about the things they felt, whether that was in character or not.
And part of my problem was the Mary Sue Specialness of everything in the book. On page 1, Sylvia wakes up in bed with a guy with purple eyes, and it just gets worse from there; nobody has short hair, or eyes of a normal color, or an ordinary, demographically plausible name.
There's the germ of something wonderful here, and it all clusters around Iris, the grandmother, and her Fiber Guild. Everything in Iris' POV, everything about the Fiber Guild, I loved. The changeling was also wonderful, with a truly alien mind. But I can't recommend this one.
Part of the problem was the plot's dependence on things I just didn't believe. The human antagonist was completely laughable; I never bought his threats for a moment. And the plot required that the obvious answer to Sylvia's parentage never occur to Iris, which I also didn't believe.
Second, it was awfully tell-y -- people spent an awful lot of time telling each other about the things they felt, whether that was in character or not.
And part of my problem was the Mary Sue Specialness of everything in the book. On page 1, Sylvia wakes up in bed with a guy with purple eyes, and it just gets worse from there; nobody has short hair, or eyes of a normal color, or an ordinary, demographically plausible name.
November 5, 2012
What a beautiful, lovely book. Solstice Wood is a wonderful blend of the mundane and the mystical, all tied up through misunderstanding.
Two worlds collided badly in McKillip's Winter Rose and in this book, generations later the reverberations of that are still present. After Rois Melior won Corbett Lynn back from the queen of the winter wood, spells and guardians were put in place to keep the wood folk away and contained.
If you follow tradition and the path set down by your forebears, is there ever room to re-evaluate the situation and see if perhaps, it is time for tradition to change.
This, really, is the crux of Solstice Wood. It is beautifully told through differing first person point of view characters. This manner of writing seems odd to me at first, until I realised that all of them had a different view on the same truth and only together could the full story be told and understood.
McKillip's lyrical writing still shines, but in this modern world tale, it is tempered with the everyday, and I think this probably makes Solstice Wood more accessible to the causal reader. I love the way she writes - I always imagined I would like to "write like Patricia McKillip, but less obscure" and that's how this book feels. It's still weaves magic with words, but I feel much more like I understood the story than I sometimes do at the end of one of her books.
This book makes a much deeper, emotional sense if you've read Winter Rose, but it still works alone. All the same, I'd say read both. Why miss out on another good story.
[Copied across from Library Thing; 5 November 2012]
Two worlds collided badly in McKillip's Winter Rose and in this book, generations later the reverberations of that are still present. After Rois Melior won Corbett Lynn back from the queen of the winter wood, spells and guardians were put in place to keep the wood folk away and contained.
If you follow tradition and the path set down by your forebears, is there ever room to re-evaluate the situation and see if perhaps, it is time for tradition to change.
This, really, is the crux of Solstice Wood. It is beautifully told through differing first person point of view characters. This manner of writing seems odd to me at first, until I realised that all of them had a different view on the same truth and only together could the full story be told and understood.
McKillip's lyrical writing still shines, but in this modern world tale, it is tempered with the everyday, and I think this probably makes Solstice Wood more accessible to the causal reader. I love the way she writes - I always imagined I would like to "write like Patricia McKillip, but less obscure" and that's how this book feels. It's still weaves magic with words, but I feel much more like I understood the story than I sometimes do at the end of one of her books.
This book makes a much deeper, emotional sense if you've read Winter Rose, but it still works alone. All the same, I'd say read both. Why miss out on another good story.
[Copied across from Library Thing; 5 November 2012]
January 2, 2017
This book was a very enjoyable read! It would be better appreciated by first reading Winter Rose.
Set in contemporary times, Sylvia Lynn, the great, great,great granddaughter of Winter Rose's protagonist Rois Melior returns to her childhood home, Lynn Hall after living away for many years. Lynn Hall still is a portal to Faerie and the woods surrounding it are still inhabited by mysterious forces. Since the time of Rois Melior, the local women have learned to bind the forces and close the portals by knitting, embroidering and weaving in a secretive group called the Fiber Guild.
Sylvia must confront her past and find out where she stands in all this.
Where as there were parts in Winter Rose that were too repetitive, in Solstice Woods there is not one slow or boring part. However what I missed were Patricia A. McKillip "psychedelic trip" like sections that were in Winter Rose, where it is impossible to tell dream from reality. In this book the two are always easily discernible. All and all this was a fun read for everyone who likes books where Faerie meets our world.
Set in contemporary times, Sylvia Lynn, the great, great,great granddaughter of Winter Rose's protagonist Rois Melior returns to her childhood home, Lynn Hall after living away for many years. Lynn Hall still is a portal to Faerie and the woods surrounding it are still inhabited by mysterious forces. Since the time of Rois Melior, the local women have learned to bind the forces and close the portals by knitting, embroidering and weaving in a secretive group called the Fiber Guild.
Sylvia must confront her past and find out where she stands in all this.
Where as there were parts in Winter Rose that were too repetitive, in Solstice Woods there is not one slow or boring part. However what I missed were Patricia A. McKillip "psychedelic trip" like sections that were in Winter Rose, where it is impossible to tell dream from reality. In this book the two are always easily discernible. All and all this was a fun read for everyone who likes books where Faerie meets our world.
December 6, 2013
As you can see by the star rating, this book did not impress me much. Which is pretty sad, considering that it's the sequel to Winter Rose, my favorite book for years and years. It was in fact the book I read out loud to my husband when we were first married so that he could truly understand me. (I'm not the only one who does this, right? I mean, it's the obvious next step in a relationship after thoroughly perusing one another's bookshelves) Unfortunately, where Winter Rose is subtle, poetic, and literary, Solstice Wood is, well, not. Next time I'll skip the sequel and just read Winter Rose again instead.
May 25, 2022
Solstice Wood is a soothing novel for a bleak day. It's full of suspense, but still calm and peaceful. McKillip's signature prosaic style is just beautiful.
January 12, 2022
VERY different from Winter Rose! You can tell it’s the same world, but the change of writing to showcase the change of time period was something I wasn’t expecting. It was almost jarring going from one to the other, but I liked the change to the modern feel of the words and world once I got I to it! I loved the idea that a sewing circle is the only thing keeping the fay world at bay! It made me want to pick up my crochet hook and start crafting! I really ended up enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would!
February 7, 2025
It's been a while since I have read any book by McKillip; such a good writer. This is a lovely story.
November 29, 2018
Solstice Wood follows Winter Rose, set several generations in the future, with the main character being a distant descendant of Rois, who was the main character in Winter Rose. This book almost has the same feel as the first–very much set in nature and has a dreamy, misty sort of atmosphere to it; however, because it’s grounded in present-day I think that it’s a lot easier to buy into right from the beginning than the first one is. Sylvia comes home to go to her grandfather’s funeral and re-discovers the place where she grows up, a place that is haunted by stories of fae and magic and half fae-children.
It’s a story about self-discovery and identity, especially our identity in relation to our ancestors. Sylvia knows that she’s half fae–half of the very type of being that her grandmother tries so hard to protect the town from, and has a hard time with it, because she doesn’t want to cause a disturbance, but has a hard time being comfortable in her grandmother’s home because of it. What Sylvia doesn’t realize is that the town has a lot of other secrets; a guild her grandmother runs that knits and crotchets and sews magic into the town to try to keep the fae out; other people who are just as fae as Sylvia; and those who are in love with fae people and who find ways around the boundaries that are sewn into the town.
It’s an enjoyable book, a bit slow-paced, but a really nice story overall. We get the perspectives of Sylvia, Sylvia’s grandmother, and Sylvia’s cousin. Watching how their stories intertwine into something bigger is a joy to read. I also like how many parallels there are to the first book without being repetitive or redundant. I really like McKillip’s take on the world of fae and how they work/think, and I love how Rois’s experience has completely colored everything the town thinks and believes about the fae. It’s a nice lesson on how one incidence can change an entire town for generations in terms of their beliefs and attitudes.
Because I appreciated it so much in relation to the first one, I’m not sure how enjoyable it would be without reading the first book. While I think the story itself stands on its own, the characters’ journey depends so much on the understanding of Rois’s experiences that I’m not sure how well it would translate.
I enjoyed this book a lot, but like the first one, I don’t think it’s for everyone. It’s a slow and quiet story. If you like fae stories, you would probably enjoy this.
Also posted on Purple People Readers.
It’s a story about self-discovery and identity, especially our identity in relation to our ancestors. Sylvia knows that she’s half fae–half of the very type of being that her grandmother tries so hard to protect the town from, and has a hard time with it, because she doesn’t want to cause a disturbance, but has a hard time being comfortable in her grandmother’s home because of it. What Sylvia doesn’t realize is that the town has a lot of other secrets; a guild her grandmother runs that knits and crotchets and sews magic into the town to try to keep the fae out; other people who are just as fae as Sylvia; and those who are in love with fae people and who find ways around the boundaries that are sewn into the town.
It’s an enjoyable book, a bit slow-paced, but a really nice story overall. We get the perspectives of Sylvia, Sylvia’s grandmother, and Sylvia’s cousin. Watching how their stories intertwine into something bigger is a joy to read. I also like how many parallels there are to the first book without being repetitive or redundant. I really like McKillip’s take on the world of fae and how they work/think, and I love how Rois’s experience has completely colored everything the town thinks and believes about the fae. It’s a nice lesson on how one incidence can change an entire town for generations in terms of their beliefs and attitudes.
Because I appreciated it so much in relation to the first one, I’m not sure how enjoyable it would be without reading the first book. While I think the story itself stands on its own, the characters’ journey depends so much on the understanding of Rois’s experiences that I’m not sure how well it would translate.
I enjoyed this book a lot, but like the first one, I don’t think it’s for everyone. It’s a slow and quiet story. If you like fae stories, you would probably enjoy this.
Also posted on Purple People Readers.
July 5, 2007
Here's my review from June 2007:
"Bookshop owner Sylvia returns to the family home she's avoided since she was a teen. Confronted with her loving family once more, Sylvia begins to realize that her grandmother is much more than she seems--and that the local sewing circle is far more powerful than she ever dreamed. Their stitches protect the human world from encroachment by the faery world. But when Sylvia's cousin is kidnapped by the fey, she is forced to confront her own prejudices. This is a much more grounded book than McKillip's recent work, which I liked."
I rated it four stars at the time, but now I've reread it in 2014 and feel the need to knock my rating down. I didn't realize this was a reread until I got 200 pages in, when it started to feel faintly familiar. I've probably read over a thousand books since I last read this, but it's still not a good sign that I didn't remember pretty much anything from it. The characters each have distinctive hair colors, from ivory to flame to gold, but somehow their POV chapters all blend together. Which is not to say I liked nothing; McKillip has a way with words:
"Bookshop owner Sylvia returns to the family home she's avoided since she was a teen. Confronted with her loving family once more, Sylvia begins to realize that her grandmother is much more than she seems--and that the local sewing circle is far more powerful than she ever dreamed. Their stitches protect the human world from encroachment by the faery world. But when Sylvia's cousin is kidnapped by the fey, she is forced to confront her own prejudices. This is a much more grounded book than McKillip's recent work, which I liked."
I rated it four stars at the time, but now I've reread it in 2014 and feel the need to knock my rating down. I didn't realize this was a reread until I got 200 pages in, when it started to feel faintly familiar. I've probably read over a thousand books since I last read this, but it's still not a good sign that I didn't remember pretty much anything from it. The characters each have distinctive hair colors, from ivory to flame to gold, but somehow their POV chapters all blend together. Which is not to say I liked nothing; McKillip has a way with words:
Everything made me want to cry. But I couldn't; tears wouldn't come out. It was stuck inside me, this nasty, monsterish feeling, of something so uncomfortable I couldn't stand it, but I couldn't get rid of it, either. All I could do was hunker down around it, feeling it grow and grow as memories collected, and feeling myself turn into a troll, something surly and mean and snarling, my dank skin growing burls and warts, hoping nobody would come near me because my voice would flare out of me like a welder's fire.It's a great description of teen angst and grief, and I love that And I love the fairy-tale logic Sylvia employs, and the ambiguity of the fairy queen's actions.
November 20, 2020
When I read this I didn't realize McKillip had previously written a related novel, but it isn't necessary to read the earlier book first. In some ways, the story reminded me of Susanna Clark's "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell," in that the inhabitants of Fairy are dangerous, sometimes malicious, but always unpredictable, and for that alone I would recommend the book. But there is a joy in this work as well--a love of mysterious woods, wild things, and the beauty of nature--all the wonder that lured me into reading fantasy in the first place. The book shifts viewpoints with every chapter, and McKillip handles it masterfully. There is a nice twist in the book as well. I liked this one.
July 8, 2007
Patricia McKillip is a goddess!! She is my all time favorite author, and I adore all of the recent stand-alone books she's written. Most of her books are written in a place out of time, a sort of fairy tale setting (and are written in a prose poetry style that only she can do so well). This is the first foray I've read of hers into a modern, urban fantasy setting. And boy does she do it well!!
An outstanding book by McKillip.
An outstanding book by McKillip.
October 13, 2007
The multiple 1st person POV was done very poorly in this book. The characters' voices all sounded the same (yes, several of them are related to each other, so this could be understandable), so I would have trouble remembering whose chapter I was on if I stopped reading in the middle of it.
December 17, 2019
I loved more Winter Rose maybe because it had that fairy tale language meanwhile this book occurs in the present days.
September 19, 2026
Memory didn't fade in her world, nor did she really understand our habit of dying. It seemed more a matter of choice to her; she wouldn't assume that a two-hundred-year-old Rowan wouldn't find his way eventually back into her company.This is the second instance in quick succession of me revisiting the world of fantasy that so enthralled my youth. I am a great deal more wizened in the realms of both knowledge and fatigue, and it has been an exercise in endurance to discover what still works and what does not. I have little memory of the first McKillip work that convinced me of the worth of the sequel, and even rereading the review didn't do me much good beyond registering the general gushes of enthusiasm. Upon finishing this, I acknowledge the author's mastery of language in conjunction with her choice of genre, but the conservative conventions of standard US fantasy stand clearer to me than ever before. Not enough to tank the rating too much, but in terms of the author's catalog, this is likely where the buck stops.
White people are always wanting to go home again. Unfortunately, the price of whiteness was to throw over all history of national/ethnic specificity and subsume oneself in the dessicated parasite that calls itself 'US culture.' In my area, the country's latest tryst with fascism in the time of smartphones has led certain well coiffed areas to go hard into 'antebellum aesthetic', where your (white) children are safe and your (white) neighbors are constantly in and out and the (right) classes of folks are graciously serving you, just as their forbearers did for yours so many centuries ago. Add in some milquetoast witches, fanatically gendered changelings, and a suspiciously well funded bookshop enterprise, and you have yourself another Hallmark movie ready to rescue the poor misguided racially pure breedstock from her urban 'freedom' and coax her back to the ancestral home, ready to once again be disciplined into the patriarchal lineage of descent. It goes to show how deep my own habitus goes that I can acknowledge all that ideology and still come out of this with three stars. Insidious propaganda, and just imagine how well it's working on those who don't give a single fuck about most folks on planet Earth.
The one local library that had a physical copy of this weeded it between the time I first checked and the time I got around to it, which, given the substantial amount of the author's catalog still remaining on those shelves, is for the best. For I'm parsing the banalities of evil imbedded in the complacency of the white moderate, especially regarding what literatures are repeatedly marked as 'fantasy', 'escapist', and 'cozy' so long as they neve question their settler state ethos. As indicated by my rating, it still works on me on an instinctual level, but I couldn't in good conscience recommend it to anyone who is similarly trawling the fantasy field in search of something truly humanizing. Such is for sure being published to a far greater degree than it was in McKillip's time, but the rotating frenzy of suburban white womanhood currently drowning the celebrity book club circuit combined with the rent seeking chokehold of eMaterials vendors easily drowns out the more diverse even in more 'liberal' times. So, I shuffle my notes, mark my place, and return this work to my hometown library, relishing the beauty of the network that aided my access far less equivocatingly than I do that of this work. Lord knows I'd prefer to relax, but there's the whole living with oneself to contend with for the time being.
But it doesn't stop me. Or any of us. She is our moon. Our tidal pull. She is the rich deep beneath the sea, the buried treasure, the expression in the owl's eye, the perfume in the wild rose. She is what the water says when it moves. She is what humans remember when they step into the wood: a glimpse of her, memory receding faster and faster, itno the sunlight and scent and shadow, of what once they saw, once they knew.
March 17, 2022
I'm a Patricia A. McKillip mega-fan, and "Solstice Wood" was one of the few novels in this wonderful writer's ouevre that I had yet to read. While it may be read as a stand-alone, it's technically a sequel to the beautiful "Winter Rose". Opening this book for the first time and immersing myself in McKillip's trademark dreamy, rich, incantatory prose felt like coming home after a long and tiring excursion. I love the worlds she creates, which are full of fae creatures, enchanted woods, and wondrous magic. "Solstice Wood" adds to this list of delightful features a run-down Gothic mansion in the middle of a wood, and a group of local women who wield needle and thread like magic wands.
I don't think this is the best of McKillip's novels, as the plot is very simple, and I prefer her use of medieval settings to contemporary ones, as the latter (which this novel features) sometimes jar against the fantasy realms that lie beyond their borders, and prevent a full immersion in the atmosphere. Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this; I'm only sorry that my list of unread McKillip books has now grown depressingly short.
I re-read at least one of her novels every year, and treasure all of them. Now, at last, "Solstice Wood" can join their ranks.
I don't think this is the best of McKillip's novels, as the plot is very simple, and I prefer her use of medieval settings to contemporary ones, as the latter (which this novel features) sometimes jar against the fantasy realms that lie beyond their borders, and prevent a full immersion in the atmosphere. Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this; I'm only sorry that my list of unread McKillip books has now grown depressingly short.
I re-read at least one of her novels every year, and treasure all of them. Now, at last, "Solstice Wood" can join their ranks.
May 20, 2019
I have been a fan of Patricia McKillip since she published The Riddle-Master of Hed in 1976, so it pains me to write that this book really failed to meet the bar she sets so high with her other better stories.
Solstice Wood (2006) is a companion book to Winter Rose (1996) but you do not need to read Rose to read Solstice. Personally, I wish the books were not connected because in the long run there is no real need for them to have done so. IMO it actually diminishes SW which would have been a stronger tale if independent of WR.
The dilemma set up in SW is like that party game of Telephone. Person 1 whispers to Person 2 a phrase, and by the time Person 30 hears it, the meaning is mangled. The events of WR have become twisted through the generations and the current matriarch (Iris) is obsessed with blocking all fae/fairy from entering the real world. This is her mission and she is always right.
Like many of McKillip's works, this is an ensemble cast, and follows different POV's to unfold the tale. There is Iris, the grandma character whose actions are the main plot point of the story. When her husband Liam dies, it gives her a reason to demand that her granddaughter Sylvia return home for the funeral.
Why I hated Iris from the get-go is she denies her husband's last wishes - to be cremated and have his ashes spread around his ancestral home. Instead, Iris insists on a traditional funeral, and he is buried in the church graveyard with all the pomp of being the master of Leith Hall.
It's pretty clear that Iris does this out of revenge and what she views is proper. Liam has spent his life wandering away from her, exploring the mysteries of the woods (and most likely fairy), and she has felt shut out of this part of his life. It's not what the master of Leith Hall should be doing! In the end, she puts his body where she will always know where he is. No more wandering for you, Liam!
I blew a gasket reading her lame excuses on why she went against his last wishes, and Owen's statement that they couldn't have Liam blowing around. Why not?? If you consider Liam's role as guardian of Leith Hall (see WR), denying him being cast around his home could have had devastating consequences!
Iris really is a fool, and the end of the book proves it. I could have dealt with her being a selfish old lady if she had been properly punished at the end, but alas, that doesn't happen.
Reluctantly, Sylvia upends her city life to return to the backwoods town (classic Hallmark special with country girl goes to the city, returns and finds out she always belonged). She meets up with her younger cousin Tyler (another POV), and a childhood BFF Dorian (who she lost contact with), and her father, Owen.
Everyone is holding secrets and as we follow them about they get revealed. Sylvia is half-fae (this isn't really a spoiler as it is openly discussed early on that her parentage can't be trusted), Owen is having an affair with someone unacceptable, Tyler isn't what he seems, and granny's old sewing circle is a bunch of witches trying to stop the fae with their stitches (this also is revealed earlier on so I don't feel is a true spoiler).
The first time I read this book in 1996, I hated the character of Iris - and in the re-read I still hate her. As a lot of the book revolves around her making food, or running the Fabric Guild it means I have to grit my teeth a lot of the time and plow through to the better parts with Sylvia, Tyler, and late to the party - Leith.
Iris is the real weakness of this book. Her POV starts out pretty strongly as an old woman who is ready to give up Leith Hall to its heir because of the overwhelming grief of losing her husband. But this is quickly swept away and her voice just becomes cranky, her reasoning gravely flawed. Liam's death as a catalyst also gets dropped rather quickly.
An interesting aside, but barely touched upon is that Iris is a 'married-in.' The actual descendent of the WR characters is her husband Liam who told her from the beginning that there was nothing to fear from the woods.
She refuses to listen to him, and instead does what her hated MIL, Meredith told her to do - lock up the fae. I think Meredith was also a married-in, so you have these people making decisions about ancestral home of Leith Hall instead of the people who actually have a blood relationship with it.
It's almost a reverse of what happens in Winter Rose, where the fae are the problems. In Solstice Wood, it is the humans.
The many varying viewpoints is another weak point. If McKillip had stuck to three, you could get into the characters, but each chapter skips to someone else. While that gives us a well-rounded view of what is happening, we get little character development (another McKillip weakness).
The finale where Iris simply gives up the battle with a weak whimper is simply lame. This exposes another of McKillip's weaknesses: endings. They happen rather abruptly and like Diana Wynne Jones characters must be happy even though there is no justice or emotional payoff.
About half way through the book (if you can stick with it), the story starts to gain steam. Secrets start to be exposed. Sylvia claims her heritage. There is a really touching scene with Sylvia when she is trapped in the fae world and how she escapes. McKillip's descriptions of the otherworldly is top notch as always.
McKillip has a lot of very good books, and has a poetical writing style that is charming and magical when at its best. She is well worth exploring but sadly, this is not one of her best works.
This is a story about family, lies, and truths. Not a romance. This book will mostly appeal to readers who like dual worlds existing side-by-side (another McKillip favorite theme). The descriptions of fairy are some of the most powerful you'll find in books in this genre. There is also some heartfelt details of Tyler grieving for his dad.
Overall, far below McKillip's usual standards but a solid book.
Solstice Wood (2006) is a companion book to Winter Rose (1996) but you do not need to read Rose to read Solstice. Personally, I wish the books were not connected because in the long run there is no real need for them to have done so. IMO it actually diminishes SW which would have been a stronger tale if independent of WR.
The dilemma set up in SW is like that party game of Telephone. Person 1 whispers to Person 2 a phrase, and by the time Person 30 hears it, the meaning is mangled. The events of WR have become twisted through the generations and the current matriarch (Iris) is obsessed with blocking all fae/fairy from entering the real world. This is her mission and she is always right.
Like many of McKillip's works, this is an ensemble cast, and follows different POV's to unfold the tale. There is Iris, the grandma character whose actions are the main plot point of the story. When her husband Liam dies, it gives her a reason to demand that her granddaughter Sylvia return home for the funeral.
Why I hated Iris from the get-go is she denies her husband's last wishes - to be cremated and have his ashes spread around his ancestral home. Instead, Iris insists on a traditional funeral, and he is buried in the church graveyard with all the pomp of being the master of Leith Hall.
It's pretty clear that Iris does this out of revenge and what she views is proper. Liam has spent his life wandering away from her, exploring the mysteries of the woods (and most likely fairy), and she has felt shut out of this part of his life. It's not what the master of Leith Hall should be doing! In the end, she puts his body where she will always know where he is. No more wandering for you, Liam!
I blew a gasket reading her lame excuses on why she went against his last wishes, and Owen's statement that they couldn't have Liam blowing around. Why not?? If you consider Liam's role as guardian of Leith Hall (see WR), denying him being cast around his home could have had devastating consequences!
Iris really is a fool, and the end of the book proves it. I could have dealt with her being a selfish old lady if she had been properly punished at the end, but alas, that doesn't happen.
Reluctantly, Sylvia upends her city life to return to the backwoods town (classic Hallmark special with country girl goes to the city, returns and finds out she always belonged). She meets up with her younger cousin Tyler (another POV), and a childhood BFF Dorian (who she lost contact with), and her father, Owen.
Everyone is holding secrets and as we follow them about they get revealed. Sylvia is half-fae (this isn't really a spoiler as it is openly discussed early on that her parentage can't be trusted), Owen is having an affair with someone unacceptable, Tyler isn't what he seems, and granny's old sewing circle is a bunch of witches trying to stop the fae with their stitches (this also is revealed earlier on so I don't feel is a true spoiler).
The first time I read this book in 1996, I hated the character of Iris - and in the re-read I still hate her. As a lot of the book revolves around her making food, or running the Fabric Guild it means I have to grit my teeth a lot of the time and plow through to the better parts with Sylvia, Tyler, and late to the party - Leith.
Iris is the real weakness of this book. Her POV starts out pretty strongly as an old woman who is ready to give up Leith Hall to its heir because of the overwhelming grief of losing her husband. But this is quickly swept away and her voice just becomes cranky, her reasoning gravely flawed. Liam's death as a catalyst also gets dropped rather quickly.
An interesting aside, but barely touched upon is that Iris is a 'married-in.' The actual descendent of the WR characters is her husband Liam who told her from the beginning that there was nothing to fear from the woods.
She refuses to listen to him, and instead does what her hated MIL, Meredith told her to do - lock up the fae. I think Meredith was also a married-in, so you have these people making decisions about ancestral home of Leith Hall instead of the people who actually have a blood relationship with it.
It's almost a reverse of what happens in Winter Rose, where the fae are the problems. In Solstice Wood, it is the humans.
The many varying viewpoints is another weak point. If McKillip had stuck to three, you could get into the characters, but each chapter skips to someone else. While that gives us a well-rounded view of what is happening, we get little character development (another McKillip weakness).
The finale where Iris simply gives up the battle with a weak whimper is simply lame. This exposes another of McKillip's weaknesses: endings. They happen rather abruptly and like Diana Wynne Jones characters must be happy even though there is no justice or emotional payoff.
About half way through the book (if you can stick with it), the story starts to gain steam. Secrets start to be exposed. Sylvia claims her heritage. There is a really touching scene with Sylvia when she is trapped in the fae world and how she escapes. McKillip's descriptions of the otherworldly is top notch as always.
McKillip has a lot of very good books, and has a poetical writing style that is charming and magical when at its best. She is well worth exploring but sadly, this is not one of her best works.
This is a story about family, lies, and truths. Not a romance. This book will mostly appeal to readers who like dual worlds existing side-by-side (another McKillip favorite theme). The descriptions of fairy are some of the most powerful you'll find in books in this genre. There is also some heartfelt details of Tyler grieving for his dad.
Overall, far below McKillip's usual standards but a solid book.
March 15, 2026
i was curious on how she’d handle a contemporary setting and the answer is: not bad? i struggled through the first part of this because it dragged a bit with all the different perspectives and glacial pacing. the plot picked up around halfway through, and it made me curious enough to finish it this weekend.
her writing is luminous and enchanting as always, her words the spell and the axis the magic was spun around — i was left a bit dissatisfied though, especially with how indistinct the character’s voices are that sometimes i got a bit confused whose chapter it was that i’m currently in. all in all, not quite as dreamy and otherworldly as changeling sea, not as transformative and compelling as forgotten beasts of eld, but it wasn’t bad. just a bit hollow, compared to the other gems she has.
her writing is luminous and enchanting as always, her words the spell and the axis the magic was spun around — i was left a bit dissatisfied though, especially with how indistinct the character’s voices are that sometimes i got a bit confused whose chapter it was that i’m currently in. all in all, not quite as dreamy and otherworldly as changeling sea, not as transformative and compelling as forgotten beasts of eld, but it wasn’t bad. just a bit hollow, compared to the other gems she has.
December 26, 2024
Patricia McKillip’s Winter Rose is among my favorite books of all time, and I almost didn’t read Solstice Wood because I knew it could never compare to its predecessor. Solstice Wood builds off the ideas introduced in Winter Rose but is very much its own story, taking place in the modern world and featuring a dramatic lack of McKillip’s lyricism and fairytale-spinning. However, what amazes me is that Solstice Wood, while not being an example of McKillip’s best work and usual style, is still vastly superior to 75% of the books I have ever read. That’s McKillip for you.
Hundreds of years after Rois Melior won her victory and her beloved Corbet Lynn against the vicious fae queen of the wood, Rois’ great-great-great-granddaughter, aloof bookstore owner Sylvia Lynn, returns to Lynnwood for the funeral of her grandfather Liam, only to find that her fearless grandmother Iris expects her to stay at Lynn Hall and learn more about their family’s secret heritage. Though Sylvia is at first hesitant to make any commitments to stay at the place she fled seven years ago, she soon is pulled into a web of danger and realizes that Lynnwood is home to far more secrets than she expected. As Sylvia sorts through her own past, four other characters take center stage alongside her:
Solstice Wood, while technically a sequel to Winter Rose (one of my favorite McKillip books), takes only a few sparse elements from its predecessor — the action takes place at Lynn Hall and its surrounding wood and village, and the main characters are descendants of Rois Melior and Corbet Lynn. Beyond those connections, however, Solstice Wood tells an entirely different storyline and actually goes beyond the themes of Winter Rose, challenging and reexamining the tenets of McKillip’s first story in a really interesting way. It’s a cross-generational story that asks us to reconsider everything we know about Winter Rose: it teaches us that there is always room to reexamine traditions and legacies and adapt them to the modern world. McKillip draws on some of the oldest fae and changeling stories in existence — the Hansel and Gretel fairytale, Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market”, the Greek Hades and Persephone myth — and reinvents them in such fascinating ways. Solstice Wood manages to feel fresh and inquisitive while also remaining rooted in something incredibly ancient and well-established, like a reexamination of an ancestral myth or the rediscovery of a new viewpoint.
The writing style of Solstice Wood is vastly different from most McKillip books because it takes place in the modern world, and McKillip’s trademark lyrical fairytale prose is dampened considerably. She focuses on the characters’ motivations and spares us from unnecessary exposition by having most of the characters already know the lore of the wood, just harboring their own secrets that are revealed one by one. McKillip also, as usual, makes Solstice Wood very much female-centric — her male characters are important and interesting, but it’s the women who drive the heart of the narrative and sparkle with life and vigor. They bind the gateways between worlds, find ways to rewrite their own stories, and bake cookies while dealing with the impossible things happening in their kitchens.
Solstice Wood also takes a bold step by rooting Winter Rose firmly in the real world, whereas most of McKillip’s works take place in fictional fantasy realms. According to context clues, Winter Rose took place somewhere in the American colonies (probably upstate New York or Pennsylvania) sometime shortly before or after the American Revolution. Just the same, McKillip achieves her usual goal of injecting magical realism into every sentence, using the fiber arts as a beautiful representation of what magic might look like in the real world.
At first I struggled with McKillip’s choice to have five separate first-person narrators in Solstice Wood, but I grew to appreciate that choice as more and more perspectives were revealed and the characters’ voices grew more distinct.
One of the major recurring themes in Solstice Wood was the seemingly irreconcilable difference between the fae world and the human world. In Winter Rose, we saw the fae as harsh, cruel, unloving beings who stole children for fun and destroyed humans’ lives at their whims. The characters of Solstice Wood (Iris in particular) operate under this assumption, believing that all fae are evil and must be contained at any cost.
Though Solstice Wood features a simpler plotline than some of McKillip’s other works, I was still left with some unanswered questions by the end of the book. All these unanswered questions are not the mark of a poorly-written book; on the contrary, a McKillip book is always full of them, and I’ve found that I can usually tease out some good hypotheses if I look hard enough.
With that said, Solstice Wood did have a few elements that I found lacking. Overall, it lacks a little of the magic of a usual McKillip book simply by doing away with most of her fairytale settings and intoxicating prose. A few characters and plot points were not quite as well developed as I would have liked, and the entire narrative was lacking in that bittersweet, heart-rending quality that most of McKillip’s stories involve. I also really wished McKillip had incorporated just a few more little callbacks to Winter Rose — I would have loved to have learned what happened to Perrin and Laurel, or seen a little of the viciousness of the Winter Queen, or even had a little nod to the fact that Corbet and Rois were very much fae themselves. Also, Corbet’s name was misspelled throughout the entire book as Corbett! Why!
Patricia McKillip definitely stepped out of her comfort zone with Solstice Wood, and the result is a succinct, comfortable read that feels much less abstract than her usual works. It’s a tale as tangled and unpredictable as the wood itself, and I really appreciate how McKillip did not give in to the usual trappings of a sequel, creating a completely new narrative that drew me in and made me believe that there might be magic anywhere around me — in the stitches of a quilt, under the waters of a creek, or even in the notes of a violin.
Hundreds of years after Rois Melior won her victory and her beloved Corbet Lynn against the vicious fae queen of the wood, Rois’ great-great-great-granddaughter, aloof bookstore owner Sylvia Lynn, returns to Lynnwood for the funeral of her grandfather Liam, only to find that her fearless grandmother Iris expects her to stay at Lynn Hall and learn more about their family’s secret heritage. Though Sylvia is at first hesitant to make any commitments to stay at the place she fled seven years ago, she soon is pulled into a web of danger and realizes that Lynnwood is home to far more secrets than she expected. As Sylvia sorts through her own past, four other characters take center stage alongside her:
Solstice Wood, while technically a sequel to Winter Rose (one of my favorite McKillip books), takes only a few sparse elements from its predecessor — the action takes place at Lynn Hall and its surrounding wood and village, and the main characters are descendants of Rois Melior and Corbet Lynn. Beyond those connections, however, Solstice Wood tells an entirely different storyline and actually goes beyond the themes of Winter Rose, challenging and reexamining the tenets of McKillip’s first story in a really interesting way. It’s a cross-generational story that asks us to reconsider everything we know about Winter Rose: it teaches us that there is always room to reexamine traditions and legacies and adapt them to the modern world. McKillip draws on some of the oldest fae and changeling stories in existence — the Hansel and Gretel fairytale, Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market”, the Greek Hades and Persephone myth — and reinvents them in such fascinating ways. Solstice Wood manages to feel fresh and inquisitive while also remaining rooted in something incredibly ancient and well-established, like a reexamination of an ancestral myth or the rediscovery of a new viewpoint.
The writing style of Solstice Wood is vastly different from most McKillip books because it takes place in the modern world, and McKillip’s trademark lyrical fairytale prose is dampened considerably. She focuses on the characters’ motivations and spares us from unnecessary exposition by having most of the characters already know the lore of the wood, just harboring their own secrets that are revealed one by one. McKillip also, as usual, makes Solstice Wood very much female-centric — her male characters are important and interesting, but it’s the women who drive the heart of the narrative and sparkle with life and vigor. They bind the gateways between worlds, find ways to rewrite their own stories, and bake cookies while dealing with the impossible things happening in their kitchens.
“Women hold their councils of war in kitchens: the knives are there, and the cups of coffee, and the towels to dry the tears.”
Solstice Wood also takes a bold step by rooting Winter Rose firmly in the real world, whereas most of McKillip’s works take place in fictional fantasy realms. According to context clues, Winter Rose took place somewhere in the American colonies (probably upstate New York or Pennsylvania) sometime shortly before or after the American Revolution. Just the same, McKillip achieves her usual goal of injecting magical realism into every sentence, using the fiber arts as a beautiful representation of what magic might look like in the real world.
At first I struggled with McKillip’s choice to have five separate first-person narrators in Solstice Wood, but I grew to appreciate that choice as more and more perspectives were revealed and the characters’ voices grew more distinct.
“She is the rich deep beneath the sea, the buried treasure, the expression in the owl's eye, the perfume in the wild rose. She is what the water says when it moves. She is what humans remember when they step into the wood: a glimpse of her, memory receding faster and faster, into sunlight and scent and shadow, of what once they saw, once they knew.”
One of the major recurring themes in Solstice Wood was the seemingly irreconcilable difference between the fae world and the human world. In Winter Rose, we saw the fae as harsh, cruel, unloving beings who stole children for fun and destroyed humans’ lives at their whims. The characters of Solstice Wood (Iris in particular) operate under this assumption, believing that all fae are evil and must be contained at any cost.
Though Solstice Wood features a simpler plotline than some of McKillip’s other works, I was still left with some unanswered questions by the end of the book. All these unanswered questions are not the mark of a poorly-written book; on the contrary, a McKillip book is always full of them, and I’ve found that I can usually tease out some good hypotheses if I look hard enough.
“Maybe. Maybe not. But maybe.”
With that said, Solstice Wood did have a few elements that I found lacking. Overall, it lacks a little of the magic of a usual McKillip book simply by doing away with most of her fairytale settings and intoxicating prose. A few characters and plot points were not quite as well developed as I would have liked, and the entire narrative was lacking in that bittersweet, heart-rending quality that most of McKillip’s stories involve. I also really wished McKillip had incorporated just a few more little callbacks to Winter Rose — I would have loved to have learned what happened to Perrin and Laurel, or seen a little of the viciousness of the Winter Queen, or even had a little nod to the fact that Corbet and Rois were very much fae themselves. Also, Corbet’s name was misspelled throughout the entire book as Corbett! Why!
Patricia McKillip definitely stepped out of her comfort zone with Solstice Wood, and the result is a succinct, comfortable read that feels much less abstract than her usual works. It’s a tale as tangled and unpredictable as the wood itself, and I really appreciate how McKillip did not give in to the usual trappings of a sequel, creating a completely new narrative that drew me in and made me believe that there might be magic anywhere around me — in the stitches of a quilt, under the waters of a creek, or even in the notes of a violin.
March 23, 2024
This book has a lot going against it:
1. I hate urban fantasies.
2. Winter Rose was fantastic.
3. The modern writing makes the author's story suffer.
However comma…
This book has a lot of redeeming factors:
1. Its fantasy aspects were amazing.
2. Winter Rose was fantastic.
3. Whenever the author was liberated from the confines of the urban/modern setting, her writing flourished and took on its usual lyrical quality.
I really loved some elements of this novel, but on the whole it was simply poorly executed, in my humble opinion. I am very sad and disappointed to rate the sequel so low. Oh well.
1. I hate urban fantasies.
2. Winter Rose was fantastic.
3. The modern writing makes the author's story suffer.
However comma…
This book has a lot of redeeming factors:
1. Its fantasy aspects were amazing.
2. Winter Rose was fantastic.
3. Whenever the author was liberated from the confines of the urban/modern setting, her writing flourished and took on its usual lyrical quality.
I really loved some elements of this novel, but on the whole it was simply poorly executed, in my humble opinion. I am very sad and disappointed to rate the sequel so low. Oh well.
April 20, 2026
Didn’t carry the same magic as Winter Rose, but I enjoyed the story and relationships.
October 31, 2015
Solstice Wood is a loose sequel to Winter Rose, set a few generations later in the same place. That gives it a really weird feel, because it’s very much rooted in place and time, while Winter Rose could be almost anywhere, anywhen. I don’t really remember the same concrete sense of place about Winter Rose at all; perhaps because half of it was spent in the other world, but still. That felt untethered in time, and this really isn’t — planes, phones, worrying about reception. It feels realistic, and that’s odd compared to the narrator of Winter Rose and her unconcern for the barriers between what’s real and what isn’t.
Oddly enough, although I understood it better, I think I liked it less than Winter Rose. Some of the beauty and mystery was missing — which in a way was part of the point, but still. And the main character’s grandmother is just stunningly unable to see what’s going on under her nose for someone who is meant to be stubborn and shrewd. Love blinds us all, I guess, but it still felt odd.
The fae stuff in this book is perhaps more attractive than in Winter Rose, though; we get to see the gentler side, the enticing side, and more nuance. Still, I’m not greatly enamoured.
Originally posted here.
Oddly enough, although I understood it better, I think I liked it less than Winter Rose. Some of the beauty and mystery was missing — which in a way was part of the point, but still. And the main character’s grandmother is just stunningly unable to see what’s going on under her nose for someone who is meant to be stubborn and shrewd. Love blinds us all, I guess, but it still felt odd.
The fae stuff in this book is perhaps more attractive than in Winter Rose, though; we get to see the gentler side, the enticing side, and more nuance. Still, I’m not greatly enamoured.
Originally posted here.
May 8, 2009
Solstice Wood is the sequal (of sorts) to Winter Rose, published ten years before. Rois and Corbet Lynn's decendants still live in Lynn Hall, and have taken upon themselves to block off the gateways between the human and faerie worlds, to keep the malicious Queen of the Wood from ensnaring and destroying any more people.
But when Liam Lynn dies, his granddaughter Sylvia, as heir to Lynn Hall, is forced to come back and face the wood she'd been running from all her life. And when she gets there, she finds the gateways haven't been closed as well as they should have been.
I wouldn't call Solstice Wood one of Patricia McKillip's best books. It has the oddly etherial quality that her works tend to have, but still feels almost clunky at times. The characters aren't as well developed as they might have been--you don't feel like you really understand them, even at the end.
Altogether a pleasant read, but perhaps not a book I'll feel compelled to read again.
But when Liam Lynn dies, his granddaughter Sylvia, as heir to Lynn Hall, is forced to come back and face the wood she'd been running from all her life. And when she gets there, she finds the gateways haven't been closed as well as they should have been.
I wouldn't call Solstice Wood one of Patricia McKillip's best books. It has the oddly etherial quality that her works tend to have, but still feels almost clunky at times. The characters aren't as well developed as they might have been--you don't feel like you really understand them, even at the end.
Altogether a pleasant read, but perhaps not a book I'll feel compelled to read again.
January 1, 2012
Reading a Patricia Mckillip's book, is as close as i will ever get, of enjoying poetry.
As always, i felt like the author words, took a life of their own, ensnaring me in them.
I really liked the different narrators perspectives. For me that gave another fluidity to the story which i loved.
There were parts of it, where, i couldn't help myself but reading them out loud. The images, and words were so strong, that i felt that they just had to be spoken. This is a story about rethinking the past, and the choices that we've always assumed as correct. It's a story about legacies and new directions. In the beggining i couldn't help myself comparing this to "Winter Rose", and i started to find this one,lacking by comparison. But then, i started a chapter told by Iris perspective, and i found myself, once again bound by the author's magic.
Beautiful.
As always, i felt like the author words, took a life of their own, ensnaring me in them.
I really liked the different narrators perspectives. For me that gave another fluidity to the story which i loved.
There were parts of it, where, i couldn't help myself but reading them out loud. The images, and words were so strong, that i felt that they just had to be spoken. This is a story about rethinking the past, and the choices that we've always assumed as correct. It's a story about legacies and new directions. In the beggining i couldn't help myself comparing this to "Winter Rose", and i started to find this one,lacking by comparison. But then, i started a chapter told by Iris perspective, and i found myself, once again bound by the author's magic.
Beautiful.
March 14, 2013
I can see now why Patricia McKillip is so popular and has won awards. Her writing puts you right in the scene. Its very descriptive without going overboard. Because this book had so much to do with nature, her descriptions played an important role in the story. I did not read the previous book, Winter Rose, which started this series. That did not seem to matter. I am curious why there was ten years between books. I felt there should have been more but maybe there will be another, hopefully in less than 10 years. My favorite part of the book is its sewing circle, a group of women who get together once a month, to sew spells and protections against what lives in the woods and beyond.
June 15, 2010
Ehhhh.... the premise behind this book (that the Far are real and even in this modern world there are interactions between them and the human world) was strong and interesting, ultimately there was just something off about the whole book. The point of view shifted for each chapter, always in first person, but somehow not even this perspective managed to make either the characters or their relationships seem very three-dimensional or believable. Younger readers may be less bothered and the fairy tale references were entertaining, but ultimately the plot points were rather weak and the resolution is equally lackluster.
June 28, 2011
Ah, now there's a book that knows how to stick a landing. Classic McKillip, even though it makes a nod at a modern/realism setting.
November 17, 2019
"I smoothed the linen on my knee, touched my stitches. Unskillful as they were, they formed a pattern, I realized; they bound one thing to another; they changed the shape of a tiny piece of the world." ~ Sylvia (99)
Although officially a sequel to Winter Rose, this story works well as a standalone. However, it is a very difficult book to describe. I'm so glad I read it - and incredibly pleased to finally have it as part of my personal collection - but oddly enough I think I might have enjoyed it more had it been by another author.
Like Kingfisher, Solstice Wood does not use her usual cover artist, Kinuko Y. Craft, and I think that is to deliberately signify that these books are contemporary in tone. But whereas Kingfisher lived in a liminal space between ordinary and extraordinary and featured a lot of McKillip's trademark play with language and lush, nearly poetic descriptions, Solstice Wood is plainly written, almost spare. More like an outline of one of her stories than a story itself.
I absolutely LOVE the idea of stitching - expressed through knitting, crochet, sewing and embroidery - being a form of magic, used to guard the passages between worlds and meant to trap otherworldly creatures. It's my very favourite part of the book!
But I had a major issue, which really threw me out of the story:
Lynn Hall is the extraordinary house of Rois Melior and Corbett Lynn from Winter Rose; every part of it is a portal. When Sylvia, Rois' third-great-granddaughter inherits the Hall after her grandfather's death, she doesn't know how to tell her grandmother Iris that she knows she is part of two worlds - half-human but also half-Fay.
Iris must weigh her love for her granddaughter against her long leadership as head of the Fiber Guild (really a coven of sorts) guardians, and events soon conspire to make both sides - human and other - negotiate a truce at long last.
There is a large cast of characters, and due to the shortness of the story, unfortunately I never got much of a feel for any one of them, not even Sylvia. There just wasn't time. The narrative skims along like a pebble cast on still waters; we see the ripples, but not the depths. It's a bit like magical realism in that it frequently mentions the existence of magic, but that magic looks very different depending on the viewpoint of the character, and for some of them, it may not exist at all.
I enjoyed it very much, but I don't think McKillip says anything here that she hasn't already done - and done better - in her other novels. It's been a long time since I've read Winter Rose though and I would like to reread both books back-to-back someday; I may be missing connections. I like it, but I don't love it - yet.
Although officially a sequel to Winter Rose, this story works well as a standalone. However, it is a very difficult book to describe. I'm so glad I read it - and incredibly pleased to finally have it as part of my personal collection - but oddly enough I think I might have enjoyed it more had it been by another author.
Like Kingfisher, Solstice Wood does not use her usual cover artist, Kinuko Y. Craft, and I think that is to deliberately signify that these books are contemporary in tone. But whereas Kingfisher lived in a liminal space between ordinary and extraordinary and featured a lot of McKillip's trademark play with language and lush, nearly poetic descriptions, Solstice Wood is plainly written, almost spare. More like an outline of one of her stories than a story itself.
I absolutely LOVE the idea of stitching - expressed through knitting, crochet, sewing and embroidery - being a form of magic, used to guard the passages between worlds and meant to trap otherworldly creatures. It's my very favourite part of the book!
But I had a major issue, which really threw me out of the story:
Lynn Hall is the extraordinary house of Rois Melior and Corbett Lynn from Winter Rose; every part of it is a portal. When Sylvia, Rois' third-great-granddaughter inherits the Hall after her grandfather's death, she doesn't know how to tell her grandmother Iris that she knows she is part of two worlds - half-human but also half-Fay.
Iris must weigh her love for her granddaughter against her long leadership as head of the Fiber Guild (really a coven of sorts) guardians, and events soon conspire to make both sides - human and other - negotiate a truce at long last.
There is a large cast of characters, and due to the shortness of the story, unfortunately I never got much of a feel for any one of them, not even Sylvia. There just wasn't time. The narrative skims along like a pebble cast on still waters; we see the ripples, but not the depths. It's a bit like magical realism in that it frequently mentions the existence of magic, but that magic looks very different depending on the viewpoint of the character, and for some of them, it may not exist at all.
I enjoyed it very much, but I don't think McKillip says anything here that she hasn't already done - and done better - in her other novels. It's been a long time since I've read Winter Rose though and I would like to reread both books back-to-back someday; I may be missing connections. I like it, but I don't love it - yet.
August 13, 2018
2.5 stars
From the writing style, I guessed this as published in the 1990s. It's actually 2006.
The writing has a fuzzy, fairy-tale lyrical style. It's written in first-person perspective, primarily alternating between the core members of the family: Sylvia, who is called home when her grandfather dies; Tyler, her cousin; Iris, her grandmother; and Owen, her grandmother's friend. (There are other perspectives too - like the Changeling's.)
I liked the sense of family - you can sense that family is complicated, and they don't necessarily understand each other, but they don't hate each other. I liked the description of the Fabric Guild as well - in fact, I loved the details and the variety of sewing, embroidery, and crochet that they do. The description of how magic works is fuzzy by current standards, but it fits the atmosphere of the piece.
I liked what Tyler thinks of Sylvia too:
It's not a bad book, but it also didn't feel like an interesting book - and so, 2.5 stars. In terms of reads, this is a woollen blanket - the writing style feels dense, but it is an easy, comforting read.
From the writing style, I guessed this as published in the 1990s. It's actually 2006.
The writing has a fuzzy, fairy-tale lyrical style. It's written in first-person perspective, primarily alternating between the core members of the family: Sylvia, who is called home when her grandfather dies; Tyler, her cousin; Iris, her grandmother; and Owen, her grandmother's friend. (There are other perspectives too - like the Changeling's.)
I liked the sense of family - you can sense that family is complicated, and they don't necessarily understand each other, but they don't hate each other. I liked the description of the Fabric Guild as well - in fact, I loved the details and the variety of sewing, embroidery, and crochet that they do. The description of how magic works is fuzzy by current standards, but it fits the atmosphere of the piece.
I liked what Tyler thinks of Sylvia too:
I thought about that, how she used to have long, curly, dark hair, and glasses like me, and she wore jeans all the time. When we came to visit, she would hug me and let me follow her around, show her bugs and old nests, stuff. Now she wore tight skirts and cool boots. Her hair was like a golden bell; I could see her face. She wore contacts; I could see her eyes. She had grown out of herself into someone else, who drove and carried a cell phone, who had a job in a big city on the other side of the country.
It's not a bad book, but it also didn't feel like an interesting book - and so, 2.5 stars. In terms of reads, this is a woollen blanket - the writing style feels dense, but it is an easy, comforting read.
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