Red Winter

I actually read this early last year, however I totally forgot to review it at the time, so I'm remedying that now!Red Winter is a book worthy of all the compliments heaped upon it, it is a delightful book that I implore all readers to pick up, regardless of whether you like fantasy books or not, it's beautiful, inside and out, and applaud Annette Marie for crafting such a wonderful world.It's set within a Japanese inspired world, where yokai and demons live among the mortals, without said mortals being any the wiser, except from a select few, who uphold the traditions of respecting the gods, whilst the rest of society does not.Red Winter starts by introducing us to Emiko, or Emi for short, a shrine maiden with a narrow view of the world and a destined path in life that she mustn't shirk from. Her path is to become the vessel for Amaterasu; and as such, must be kept secluded from the outside world, so she is of course, very naive and dutiful to a fault. I wasn't sure if I liked her early on in the book, however, that changed very quickly, when Emi started to push against the restricted life that was set out for after she discovers the truth about the ceremony that will tie her to the goddess. After this, she decides to hell with it, I'm going to start living my life, and runs into the forest, where yokai --spirits and creatures in Japanese mythology, ranging from good to evil-- dwell. She unfortunately runs into a Oni, one of the demon yokai, that is chasing a white fox, and she decides to save it, thus leading me neatly onto one of my favourite characters of all time, Shiro.Shiro is an AMAZING character, not only from the fact he is a fox yokai, or kitsune, which are one of my favourites, as they can shapeshift, create kitsune-bi (foxfire) and are known to be mischievous as heck, but also because of his personality, where he comes across as someone who doesn't need any help from anyone, holds a high opinion of himself and views humans as little more than useless; however, you can see as the book goes on that his personality and opinions begin to thaw and change. I do like a character that comes across as one thing and ends up completely different as time goes on, not to mention a character that seems all hard on the outside, but is actually a total sweetie on the inside. Not only that, but Shiro's character design is beautiful, with his white hair, ruby red eyes and the fox ears he has even in his human form.The interesting thing about Shiro is that he has lost all his memories due to being cursed, so the only thing he knows about himself is his name; however because Emi has saved his life from the oni, he owes her a life debt, so she commands him to help her get a meeting with a god. Also, I love how funny he is, he has a cutting remark for everything.Moving on to Yumei, again, love this character, he is a Tengu, who has isolated himself, holds humans with the highest disdain possible and is extremely powerful. Yumei, again, has a fabulous character design, black hair, silver eyes and can change back and forth between his raven shape at will, which is very cool. Yumei, is a very, very old yokai, however he doesn't look it and is grumpy when Emi and Shiro come to ask for his help. Again he's another one that's all grumpy on the exterior but after a while begins to warm up to Emi, although he finds Shiro incredibly irritating, and the fox yokai doesn't help his case by annoying him every chance he gets, which leads to some hilarious banter.Now, one thing I had NO IDEA about when I got this book, is that it has illustrations inside!!! I literally squealed when I saw these drawings, because my god, are they GORGEOUS!! :D The drawings themselves are in an anime style, which I immediately fell in love with, because I most certainly could imagine this (and did imagine it) as an anime in my head while I was reading it. It was a complete surprise and I was so SO happy to discover these illustrations, so applause and confetti cannons for Brittany Jackson, the artist, as she has done an amazing job on these.All in all, if I could give Red Winter a million stars, instead of just 5, then I most certainly would!! The first book in this series is wonderful, action-packed, with swoon-worthy characters, myths, legends, yokai, gods, anime like fight scenes; curses, revelations and a budding romance that is to die for. I love this series, I know I'll be reading it over and over again, and it will most definitely remain one of the best trilogies I've ever come across. :D

Ogni tanto penso a quante poche persone hanno letto o conoscono questa serie e mi viene un attacco di tristezza misto rabbia.Ma cosa state aspettando?! Red winter è spettacolare! Ed è una trilogia in continua crescita, davvero non potete perdervela.

Alright! So first of all, I really loved the worldbuilding and the plotline. The descriptions were awesome and the introduction into this new and colourful world was delicious. Not that it suprises me, since Annette Marie's other series Steel and Stone is wonderfully addicting too.The cover is amazing and very accurately depicts the beginning of another enchanting tale of fantastical magic, supernatural creatures inspired by the rich and varied myths and mythos of Japanese culture, intriguing heroes and budding relationships out of this world. The author truly paints a gorgeous and exotic picture that we as readers can drown and exist in.I really liked the dynamics between Emi and Shiro, and how they change and support each other in unexpected ways. Especially Emi undergoes a rapid growth from a frightened and "dependent girl" (read and find out what I mean...no spoilers here) to a person who knows the world isn't an idealistic place and nothing can be painted in black or white, it's all shades of grey and such...The only thing I'm not as satisfied about is the drawings inside the novel. They are good, no doubt about that, but I kinda feel that they messed up my pace a little (I don't know how to express what I mean...). Like the story is exotic and paints everything in gorgeous colours and contrasts and a magical atmosphere that is alive and then suddenly comes a black on white drawing. In some instances it suits really well, but sometimes I think a splash of colour, like red or blue or violet, could increase the dramatic effect. And it would have been even more cool to make fully coloured pictures that really showed the colours and the mysterious nature of this new world...When I imagine how I would have loved to see theese drawings, I think about the coloured pictures of the Korean Manwha series "Bride of the Water God". They are gorgeous and I really like the way the colours are displayed. It reminds me of the cover...so maybe it would suffice to say that I would have loved art that mirrored the cover. But that's just me rambling about colours and drawing and such...The book was WONDERFUL... <3

Red Winter is a beautifully written novel that completely embraces its source material. It is set in modern-day Japan, but it is easy to forget this at times as a majority of the story is set at traditional shrines and deep in oni-infested woods. The novel is easy to get in to, although does contain a lot of Japanese words and concepts. However, even if you are unfamiliar with Japanese culture and mythology, the novel does contain an extensive glossary of terms. It helpfully also includes a pronunciation guide to help readers with the character names, which I thought was particularly useful.The novel is told in the first person from the perspective of Emi, a young girl who has been groomed from youth and lead a very sheltered life as she has been chosen to be the vessel for a kami to be reborn on earth. While Emi's narrative becomes more engrossing as the story progresses and she learns more about what this fate entails, early chapters are a little slow. While Emi's world is fascinating, she is incredibly sheltered and unable to go anywhere unaccompanied. This means it takes almost 100 pages for the book to actually feel as though it is truly starting to move.While the stakes are high for Emi and there is a sense of urgency in the novel, this is not always felt by the pacing of the story. While the novel is always well written and I certainly never got board, there was not a lot of action to be found until the end of the tail. The author also had a bit of a habit for repeating information, with Emi often expositing the same information to readers over and over.However, once the novel passed its half-way mark, I was certainly hooked. While the novel ended on a bit of a cliff-hanger, it did wrap up this clear first-stage of Emi's journey, making it clear what is expected of her in the sequel.The main protagonists in the novel were very bold and memorable. While Emi seemed almost painfully naive at first, this was clearly a product of her upbringing and you certainly felt her growth as the story progressed. However, my one small criticism of Emi was that I would have liked her to show a little more independence. Emi is always relying on someone else for protection in this story, despite being proven to be a decent archer. Hopefully, this will be an area that she can grow in the sequel.Shiro also made for a great male lead, with a mysterious past and tricksy personality. He brought a lot of heart into the story and his forgotten past is a great hook for the next instalment. I also liked the way that the romance in the story built, as this was slow burning and never truly blossomed into anything solid in the story. The seeds are clearly there for a true relationship between the characters to form later in the tale.However, the one thing that I would have liked to see in the story were more female protagonists. Emi's circle of close friends are all male in this story, and all of them act as her protectors at various points. The few female characters only really have superficial roles, ranging from a jealous shrine miko to a carefree school girl. It would have been nice to see these characters fleshed out more, and hopefully it is something that will be rectified in a future instalment.So, all in all, this is a very strong start to the series. I can't wait to see where Marie will take this story from here.

Guys.GUYS.I didn't know it was possible, but I actually liked this book more than Chase the Dark.This book had everything I love in a book: strong heroine, intriguing hero (IS he a hero??), fascinating plot, scary bad guys (that, y'know, are actually creepily written, not just because the author wants them to be), and the list goes on.Basically, Emi's been groomed for most of her life to host this Japanese kami-thing thats like a god, but soon discovers there was a big secret she wasn't told about the night her body is supposed to merge with the goddess. She's a sweet girl, who's dedicated her life to serving her gods. After a chain of events, she stumbles into meeting a yokai (a spirit thingy that Emi usually Dislikes, dislikes is capitalized because she RLLY don't like them) who's FRICKIN HOT AS FOXFIRE and i swear 2 god i squealed like a lil bish when he first talked. Like, guys, he's smokin'. And after Emi saves this yokai's life, he decides he owes her....owes her some lovin'.jk, but he's suuuuper cute~The story branches off into a whirlwind of new experiences poor sheltered Emi never got to experience (due to the fact she was trained to be possessed like some exorcist s***) and the people- some not human- she meets are CRAZY weird. And I loved it!I learned so many cool things about Japanese mythology in this novel. It takes place in modern day Japan, and we get to see all the shrine rituals, clothing, and food and whatnot. Plus we got to see a bunch of the spirits that exist there. Like, there's a bunch of Japanese creatures I only heard of in anime and it was so nice to read a well-written, captivating story regarding them.They all felt so real.Anyways! If you're looking for a sign to buy this book! This is it! Say hello to your new Fox yokai bf!