Hild

Nicola Griffith's Hild: A Novel is something rare. It's a historical fantasy, but it's not a magical adventure, a bodice-ripper, a military drama, or even a political thriller. It's not the kind of book you dive into and finish a day later and forget almost immediately. Hild is a whole world with a taste and texture of its own. It lingers.

The story is a fictionalized (but not fantasized) vision of the early life of Hilda of Whitby, a slightly obscure 7th century English saint. The plot clings to the trailing skirts of a young girl who becomes the seer to a medieval King. Amid a sea of old English names and places (?thelfrith, Ealdwulf, Caer Loid, Hwicce), Hild uses her influence and intelligence to navigate the choppy waters of politics and war. It's a slow, beautiful story full of winter evenings by the hearth and long rides through the countryside and sudden spurts of violence. It's simultaneously about the huge, grinding ways that cultures change, the depth and complexity of the past, and a young girl making her own way.

For the full review, please visit my fantasy review blog at The Other Side of the Rain.