{Review Redux/Giveaway} ICE by Sarah Beth Durst

Welcome to Magic, Myth, & Mischief in celebration 
of fairy tales, mythology, and fantastic beasts of lore such as dragons, fae, mermaids, and unicorns!
Join our celebration daily at A Backwards Story and That Artsy Reader Girl!
Check out our daily schedule of events at ABS and TARG!
Stop back all week long for fun author interviews, exciting giveaways, reviews,
and more!
Twitter | Instagram | YouTube  
Join the fun by adding your own links here!
Enter the BIG giveaway here!!!
Instagram Challenge!

 

O P E N I N G   L I N E:

"0NCE UPON A TIME, the North Wind said to the Polar Bear King, 'Steal me a daughter, and when she grows, she will be your bride.'"

  Four-year-old Cassie clutched her quilt and stared at her grandmother. Tall and straight, Gram looked like a general. She perched stiffly on the edge of Cassie's bed. She had a mahogany cane in her left hand. Tonight, Dad was away from the station, which meant Cassie would hear the story. Gram never told it when Dad was home. It was the only story she ever told.

(pg. 1, US hardcover edition)

ICE by Sarah Beth Durst was the second book I EVER reviewed on this blog, back on February 13, 2010!

I also read it when I wasn't a huge YA reader yet, but the fairy tale lover in me instantly fell for this book. Because of ICE, I've become a lifelong fan of Sarah Beth Durst and purchase her books every time a new one comes out. She has a wildly innovative imagination and her books always have a flare of "different," not quite like anything you've read before! 

In honor of the fact that SBD is about to be more well-known thanks to her upcoming Lifetime movie DRINK, SLAY, LOVE on September 16th (Check out my review! It's about a female vampire who gets stabbed in the heard with a unicorn horn and gains a soul...in some ways, she reminds me of Angel from Buffy!)

Plus, SBD is going to be in town on September 23rd, and I know a lot of readers are new to her, so I really want to re-expose her greatness. Hence the repost! ❤ (Sorry if the style has changed a lot from how I write today!)

Due to all of this week's record-breaking snow (back in February 2010), I thought it was the perfect time to talk about a recent gem I just finished reading entitled ICE. It was my first time reading a book by Sarah Beth Durst and upon completion, I snagged her other two novels, INTO THE WILD and OUT OF THE WILD, from the library. I look forward to reading them because I really enjoyed the world of ICE that Durst wove together for us. I initially picked up ICE because it revolved around a fairytale (East of the Sun, West of the Moon, which is sort of a Norwegian Beauty and the Beast), which is one of my all-time favorite genres to read. It had been on my reading list for a while, but it wasn't until I started hearing positive feedback from fellow readers that I decided to actively read it. I don't know why I waited so long!

First off, I just want to say that Cassie is a kick-ass heroine. We need more girls like her in (especially YA) literature. I love the whole "Girl Power" movement that authors like Tamora Pierce (co-founder of Sheroes) have spent time nurturing. I think the only other recent author with amazing heroines that I've read lately is Kristin Cashore (If you haven't read her novels, particularly GRACELING, yet, then what are you waiting for? Run, don't walk!).

Cassie is intelligent and knows exactly what she wants in life. She has a huge heart and cares deeply for the polar bears she researches. Right before her birthday, she finds out that a terrible burden has been placed upon her shoulders. Her grandmother used to tell her a fairytale about a polar bear king and the bargain he had struck with a mortal woman, supposedly her mother, who is now trapped in the troll kingdom as penance for breaking her word. Cassie never believed the story to be true until she actually encounters the polar bear, which is where ICE truly begins. Watching Cassie and Bear's relationship bloom feels infinitely fragile and wonderous. Cassie goes from loathing and fearing Bear and her situation to developing genuine feelings for him. She even blossoms as a person and realizes just how much she can help her beloved polar bears while working with Bear and soon becomes happy with her lot in life. When tragedy befalls the couple (through a situation that reminds me strongly of the mythological tale of Cupid and Psyche), Cassie sets out on a journey to reach the ends of the earth to save her beloved. Not only is the journey long and dangerous, Cassie is also heavily pregnant by the time the story is approaching its climax. I don't want to reveal much more, but there is one part towards the end that simply took my breath away and connected a lot of the dots in the novel for me in a way I hadn't realized was possible. That moment is when I stumbled head over heels in love with ICE.

The story itself has a unique formatting. I like that every chapter starts off with Longitude, Latitude, and Altitude coordinates. Not only is this important in the context of the story, it also reveals a lot about Cassie as a person and her prior way of life before meeting Bear. I really appreciate how much thought Sarah Beth Durst put into her novel. I really felt like I was in the Arctic due to how life-life and precise all of her detailing was. For example, I wasn't sure of what, exactly, a whiteout was when I encountered the term in ICE, so I looked it up. The other day while watching news coverage of Wednesday's blizzard, the newscasters kept tossing the term "whiteout conditions" around and I knew what to expect due to my research on the term.

I really adored reading ICE and look forward to reading more books by Durst. So far, this has probably been one of my favorite books, teen or otherwise, in the past couple of seasons.

[And if you like ICE, be sure to check out other YA retellings of EAST OF THE SUN, WEST OF THE MOON: EAST by Edith Pattou and SUN AND MOON, ICE AND SNOW by Jessica Day George for two other beautiful renditions of this classic tale.]

~*~

C O N T E N T R A T I N G S

Content Ratings: highlight between ( ) for details

I don't remember. I read this SO long ago! SBD's books usually aren't that bad, although part of this fairy tale revolves around a forced marriage that results in a pregnant heroine looking to save her husband. I don't think the visuals are very graphic, but they'll be there!

~*~

C O V E R   D E S I G N:

I love how shimmery it is, replicating the icy atmosphere lying within for readers to explore. 

Plus, that silver font on the title! 

Everything about this book looks so cold. 

Hey, it got me to pick it up!!!

~*~

O F F I C I A L   I N F O:

Title: ICE

Author: Sarah Beth Durst

Release Date: Out October 6, 2009

Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books // Simon & Schuster

Received: Purchased

SUMMARY:

When Cassie was a little girl, her grandmother told her a fairy tale about her mother, who made a deal with the Polar Bear King and was swept away to the ends of the earth. Now that Cassie is older, she knows the story was a nice way of saying her mother had died. Cassie lives with her father at an Arctic research station, is determined to become a scientist, and has no time for make-believe. 

Then, on her eighteenth birthday, Cassie comes face-to-face with a polar bear who speaks to her. He tells her that her mother is alive, imprisoned at the ends of the earth. And he can bring her back — if Cassie will agree to be his bride. 

That is the beginning of Cassie's own real-life fairy tale, one that sends her on an unbelievable journey across the brutal Arctic, through the Canadian boreal forest, and on the back of the North Wind to the land east of the sun and west of the moon. Before it is over, the world she knows will be swept away, and everything she holds dear will be taken from her — until she discovers the true meaning of love and family in the magical realm of ICE. 

 ~*~

GIVEAWAY

During Magic, Myth, & Mischief,

we're giving away a book of YOUR CHOICE

from the event!

It could be ICE!

This giveaway is INTERNATIONAL to any country that Book Depository ships to.  You can also claim an e-book as a prize; it doesn't have to be a physical copy!

You must be at least 13 years old to enter or have a parent's permission!

Enter now! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway