Since Kai and Ginny were children they’ve been best friends, growing up together, playing in their building’s rooftop rose garden.
Now they are seventeen and their close ties have developed into something more. Something sweet and strong, something with kisses and plans for the future.
With the arrival of a beautiful, enigmatic girl named Mora, however, Ginny sees an abrupt, dramatic change in Kai. And, almost overnight, he and Mora disappear.
Though struggling with the perception by others that Kai may have simply broken up with her in a cruel manner and taken up with a girl he just met, Ginny knows him. She knows Kai would not do this to her.
Despite the small, painful doubts in her heart, Ginny goes after them – after Kai.
She’s armed with a book that Kai’s superstitious grandmother filled with articles and clippings about dangerous, non-human creatures and one being she fear above all others: The Snow Queen.
Searching for Kai is forcing Ginny to be stronger than ever, alone without Kai by her side. If she even finds Kai, will she still be the same person that he loved?
Will he still be capable of love?
Previously I have read Sweetly and Fathomless by Jackson Pearce, and was stunned by both. I have to say that she is fantastic at reimagining fairy tales into a dark, modern-day-world story. She’s done it yet again with Cold Spell.
In a very short amount of pages I am convinced of Kai and Ginny’s love – a love that is mature and based on years of friendship. This was vital to the rest of the story, to believe in this love – and Pearce succeeded, in my opinion.
Just as in the other books in this series, Cold Spell quickly escalates to a level of unease and creepiness mixed with emotional anguish. There’s a seeping sensation of ice cold and melancholy.
Cold Spell is spooky, mesmerizing, hypnotic and unique. I appreciate the way each book ties into each other in subtle but important ways – characters are hinted at or return. In the future, after I finally read the very first book Sisters Red (I own it now, it should be this year, ha!), I want to read all four of these books in quick succession to catch all the carry-over more easily.
Here we get a story that is chilling and impossible to put down and stop reading.
I will say that the time spent with the Travellers felt odd and out of place. I tried to go along with it because I loved everything else about Cold Spell, and as that part of the book ended up being rather persistent and lingered through the remainder – I ended up accepting it.
The Travellers just felt less real to me, made it less believable to me as a whole. But, in the end, it didn’t affect the book in a negative way. Cold Spell was just too good.
I felt Ginny’s desperate hope as though it were my own – and my final thoughts were (as noted):
Excellent, excellent, excellent.
What else can I say?
Except I hope Jackson Pearce writes more fairy-tale retellings!!!
Comments