Spinning Silver - Israel Digital

Main Content

Spinning Silver

Sample

Spinning Silver

A Novel

by Naomi Novik

More creators...

Place a Hold

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “One of the year’s strongest fantasy novels” (NPR), an imaginative retelling of the Rumpelstiltskin fairy tale from the bestselling author of Uprooted.

NEBULA AND HUGO AWARD FINALIST • NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST FANTASY BOOKS OF THE DECADE • ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Public Library
With the Nebula Award–winning Uprooted, Naomi Novik opened a brilliant new chapter in an already acclaimed career, delving into the magic of fairy tales to craft a love story that was both timeless and utterly of the now. Spinning Silver draws readers deeper into this glittering realm of fantasy, where the boundary between wonder and terror is thinner than a breath, and safety can be stolen as quickly as a kiss.
Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty—until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold. When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk—grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh—Miryem’s fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. She will face an impossible challenge and, along with two unlikely allies, uncover a secret that threatens to consume the lands of humans and Staryk alike.
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, Time, Tordotcom, Popsugar, Vox, Vulture, Paste, Bustle, Library Journal
“A perfect tale . . . A big and meaty novel, rich in both ideas and people, with the vastness of Tolkien and the empathy and joy in daily life of Le Guin.”—The New York Times Book Review
“Gorgeous, complex, and magical . . . This is the kind of book that one might wish to inhabit forever.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Cool and clever and . . . dire and wonderful.”—Laini Taylor, author of Strange the Dreamer
“The Rumpelstiltskin fairy tale has never been as captivating. . . . Spinning Silver further cements [Novik’s] place as one of the genre greats.”—Paste

Available formats-

OverDrive Listen
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Subjects-

Languages:-

English

Copies-

Available:

0
Library copies:

1

Levels-

ATOS:
Lexile:
Interest Level:
Text Difficulty:

Awards-

Alex Award
American Library Association
Audie Award
Audio Publishers Association
Hugo Award Nominee
World Science Fiction Society

Excerpts-

From the cover ��hapter 1

The real story isn’t half as pretty as the one you’ve heard. The real story is, the miller’s daughter with her long golden hair wants to catch a lord, a prince, a rich man’s son, so she goes to the moneylender and borrows for a ring and a necklace and decks herself out for the festival. And she’s beautiful enough, so the lord, the prince, the rich man’s son notices her, and dances with her, and tumbles her in a quiet hayloft when the dancing is over, and afterwards he goes home and marries the rich woman his family has picked out for him. Then the miller’s despoiled daughter tells everyone that the moneylender’s in league with the devil, and the village runs him out or maybe even stones him, so at least she gets to keep the jewels for a dowry, and the blacksmith marries her before that firstborn child comes along a little early.

Because that’s what the story’s really about: getting out of paying your debts. That’s not how they tell it, but I knew. My father was a moneylender, you see.

He wasn’t very good at it. If someone didn’t pay him back on time, he never so much as mentioned it to them. Only if our cupboards were really bare, or our shoes were falling off our feet, and my mother spoke quietly with him after I was in bed, then he’d go, unhappy, and knock on a few doors, and make it sound like an apology when he asked for some of what they owed. And if there was money in the house and someone asked to borrow, he hated to say no, even if we didn’t really have enough ourselves. So all his money, most of which had been my mother’s money, her dowry, stayed in other people’s houses. And everyone else liked it that way, even though they knew they ought to be ashamed of themselves, so they told the story often, even or especially when I could hear it.

My mother’s father was a moneylender, too, but he was a very good one. He lived in Vysnia, forty miles away by the pitted old trading road that dragged from village to village like a string full of small dirty knots. Mama often took me on visits, when she could afford a few pennies to pay someone to let us ride along at the back of a peddler’s cart or a sledge, five or six changes along the way. Sometimes we caught glimpses of the other road through the trees, the one that belonged to the Staryk, gleaming like the top of the river in winter when the snow had blown clear. “Don’t look, Miryem,” my mother would tell me, but I always kept watching it out of the corner of my eye, hoping to keep it near, because it meant a quicker journey: whoever was driving the cart would slap the horses and hurry them up until it vanished again.

One time, we heard the hooves behind us as they came off their road, a sound like ice cracking, and the driver beat the horses quick to get the cart behind a tree, and we all huddled there in the well of the wagon among the sacks, my mother’s arm wrapped around my head, holding it down so I couldn’t be tempted to take a look. They rode past us and did not stop. It was a poor peddler’s cart, covered in dull tin pots, and Staryk knights only ever came riding for gold. The hooves went jangling past, and a knife-wind blew over us, so when I sat up the end of my thin braid was frosted white, and all of my mother’s sleeve where it wrapped around me, and our backs. But the frost faded, and as soon as it was gone, the peddler said to my mother, “Well, that’s enough of a rest, isn’t it,” as if he didn’t remember why we had stopped.

“Yes,” my mother said,...

About the Author-

Naomi Novik received the 2007 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer at the World Science Fiction Convention. In 2016 she won the Nebula Award for Best Novel for Uprooted. She is also the author of the nine volumes of the Temeraire series and the graphic novel Will Supervillains Be on the Final? An avid reader of fantasy literature, Novik is also a history buff with a particular interest in the Napoleonic era and a fondness for the work of Patrick O’Brian and Jane Austen. She lives in New York City with her family and six computers.

Reviews-

Starred review from April 23, 2018
This gorgeous, complex, and magical novel, grounded in Germanic, Russian, and Jewish folklore but richly overlaid with a cohesive, creative story of its own, rises well above a mere modern re-
imagining of classic tales. Novik (Uprooted) begins the story through the eyes of Miryem, a Jewish moneylender’s daughter, whose pride in her ability to wring payments from borrowers draws the demanding attention of the terrifying, otherworldly, and rules-bound Staryk, who are ruled by a wintry, gold-loving king. Secondary characters—a peasant boy, a duke’s daughter, a tsar—eventually become narrators, weaving interconnections that feel simultaneously intimate and mythic. Novik probes the edges between the everyday and the extraordinary, balancing moods of wonder and of inevitability. Her work inspires deep musings about love, wealth, and commitment, and embodies the best of the timeless fairy-tale aesthetic. Readers will be impressed by the way Novik ties the myriad threads of her story together by the end, and, despite the book’s length, they will be sad to walk away from its deeply immersive setting. This is the kind of book that one might wish to inhabit forever.
Novik updates the story of Rumpelstiltskin with a wildly original fantasy tale that has all the markings of a future classic. A young woman with a special gift attempts to save her family but is swept up in world of magic and demons. What follows is a dark fantasy focused on three complex women in a morally nuanced world. Lisa Flanagan's steady narration, especially her accents and inflections, elevate the story wonderfully. Every character benefits from a distinct and engaging voice, particularly the raspy growl of the fire demon. The story alternates perspectives often, and Flanagan ensures that the transitions are smooth. Novik's story would stand on its own, but Flanagan's fantastic narration makes it even better. J.M.M. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine

Title Information+

Publisher

Books on Tape
OverDrive Listen

Release date:

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Release date:

Digital Rights Information+

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Burn to CD:
Permitted

Transfer to device:
Permitted

Transfer to Apple® device:
Permitted

Public performance:
Not permitted

File-sharing:
Not permitted

Peer-to-peer usage:
Not permitted

All copies of this title, including those transferred to portable devices and other media, must be deleted/destroyed at the end of the lending period.

Status bar:

by Naomi Novik

Naomi Novik

Lisa Flanagan

Available formats-

Edition-

Subjects-

Languages:-

Copies-

Levels-

Awards-

Excerpts-

About the Author-

Reviews-

Title Information+

Publisher

OverDrive Listen

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Digital Rights Information+

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Sign In

The new OverDrive is coming soon! Preview it now.

by Naomi Novik

Naomi Novik

Lisa Flanagan

Available formats-

Edition-

Subjects-

Languages:-

Copies-

Levels-

Awards-

Excerpts-

About the Author-

Reviews-

Title Information+

Publisher

OverDrive Listen

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

Digital Rights Information+

OverDrive MP3 Audiobook

You already have this title checked out.

Holds

Device Compatibility Notice

Sorry, no retailers are currently available to purchase this title. Please check back later.