Book Nook: ‘The Snow Queen’s Shadow’ by Jim C. Hines

Title: The Snow Queen’s Shadow, the fourth and final book in the Princess Series

Author: Jim C. Hines

Genre: Fantasy

The gist: This is a princess book written to appeal to men as much as women, and is essentially what would happen if Charlie's Angels met the Disney princesses and had a lesbian love affair with them resulting in a child they abandoned to the Brothers Grimm--who smacked the poor dear around until marriageable age, at which point it turned into a book (because turning into a pumpkin is just silly).

Cover art: Snow White has morphed into a Mariska Hargitay look-alike, which bothered me at first but actually fits the story quite nicely. This cover was designed by Scott Fischer (who also did the art for the first and second books) and while I like it a great deal as the final cover, my favorite of the whole series is The Mermaid’s Madness cover. Hines has also written about the evolution of Snow Queen’s cover art.

Summary:

A broken mirror. A stolen child. A final mission to try to stop an enemy they never dreamed they would face.

When a spell gone wrong shatters Snow White’s enchanted mirror, a demon escapes into the world. The demon’s magic distorts the vision of all it touches, showing people only ugliness and hate. It is a power that turns even friends and lovers into mortal foes, one that will threaten humans and fairies alike.

And the first to fall under the demon’s power is the princess, Snow White…

The best part: Hines has the reader in the palm of his hand from the first page and the action and adventure never stop, leaving one completely unable to put down the book even when wanting to throw it across the room. Characterization drives this story through brilliant world-building created from a mish-mash of fairy-tales. While the author both uses and thumbs his nose at fantasy tropes and archetypes, he also hammers them into a fully realized pseudo-medieval world of magic and mayhem that doesn’t have quite enough happily-ever-afters. The reader is never allowed to forget that princesses aren't all pink and Disney and don’t always live happily ever after. They’re people--people who can kick some serious butt.

The worst part: I imagine it's difficult to wrap up a series in one story that can also stand on its own, but I really wanted it to be happier overall. Though that is the flaw with the Disney princess happily-ever-after trope, it is also why we keep going back to it and why we hold the Disney classics so dear--in the end, we want to feel like everything can work out and balancing the realistic with the happy ending is a fine line to walk. Hines understands this, but for me, personally, he falls just a bit short.

Characters: The loss of Snow White as we know her and as part of the crime-fighting team was a devastating blow. Even though she drove the story through her villainous actions and the memories of her friends it wasn't the same and it wasn't enough. Hines spares his characters nothing while forcing them into gut-wrenching emotional choices of ethical impossibility. The introduction of a new character, Gerta, doesn’t lessen the blow as much as one would like and in some ways amplifies the loss of Snow even more. I was quite glad to see the return of the ship captain Hephyra, however her personality struck me as different in this book, which was also saddening.

Plot: I was impressed by the increasing complexity of the plot lines within the third book, , but I was blown away by the way Hines wrapped up the series with Snow Queen’s Shadow while using the confines of another fairy tale to make the book also work as a stand-alone. As much as I hate serial books that are clearly never going to end I could have happily and easily read quite a few more adventures in between these books. And while I will cheerfully re-read the previous three books in this series I am not totally sure I would want to pick up the end book again. That's not to say I won't, but I prefer the first three for the particular way they allow the adventure to live on in my imagination.

Setting: This book is set in winter and mostly takes place in Snow White’s homeland of Allesandria. The constant descriptions of snow and cold and winter make this an excellent choice to read while curled up under the air-conditioner with some extra-snuggly blankets. The action is so non-stop that elements I would normally devour such as the world-building and the magic-system ended up being leapt over because of a dire need to know what happened next. These elements seemed complex and I didn't quite always grasp some of the magical leaps and conclusions the characters came to, but Hines has built a trust with his previous books that left me willing to glide over such things to get to the point.

Writing style: Hines took a sharp turn from his usual humor-based fantasy and left an emotional story arc with very little to chuckle over. I was hoping his trademark humor would allow the story to avoid certain staples in fantasy plots like the inevitable loss of the Wise Old Mentor, although I can’t say I was surprised by that particular loss as it had been building up throughout the series. That being said, it is still a mistake to start reading a Hines book at night. You will stay up way too late and the following day, be unable to focus on anything that doesn’t revolve around finding out what happens.

In which I babble: There was recently an article in the New York Times by Valerie Gribben relating the importance of fairy tales to practicing medicine, and she touches on some of the same themes Hines includes in his work. Gribben writes, “Fairy tales are, at their core, heightened portrayals of human nature, revealing, as the glare of injury and illness does, the underbelly of mankind. Both fairy tales and medical charts chronicle the bizarre, the unfair, the tragic.” She also goes on to conclude: “Healing, I’m learning, begins with kindness, and most fairy tales teach us to show kindness wherever we can, to the stooped little beggar and the highest nobleman."

Reminds me of: If you like action-oriented female leads like Tomb Raider and Xena but crave characters that are fleshed out to avoid stereotyping, then you need to add this series to your bookshelf immediately.

You might also like: The first books in the Princess Series:

The Stepsister Scheme

The Mermaid’s Madness

Or his Goblin series--my review of the short story collection can be found here and a free short story ‘The Haunting of Jig’s Ear,’ which is included in the collection, is available here.

Quotes:

“Was she happy?”

“Almost always. She searched for joy in everything she did, and if she couldn’t find it, she created it. Yet… there was pain. Loss. She kept it locked away, but it was there. It was that buried pain that helped the demon turn her against you.”

“You blame me.”

“Blame changes nothing that has happened.”

Other reviews of interest: Geek Dad over at Wired.com has some excellent insights into the series, as does FantasyLiterature.com.

Publisher: DAW Books, distributed by Penguin Group

Release date: July 2011

Purchase the book here.