Title: A Winter’s Promise
Author: Christelle Dabos
Genre: Young Adult fantasy romance
Page count: 523, Dutch hardcover
Published on: June 6th, 2013 by Europa Editions
About A Winter’s Promise
Long ago, following a cataclysm called “The Rupture,” the world was shattered into many floating celestial islands known as arks.
Ophelia lives on Anima, an ark where objects have souls. Beneath her worn scarf and thick glasses, the young girl hides the ability to communicate with the souls of objects, and the power to travel through mirrors. Her peaceful existence on the Ark of Anima is disrupted when she is promised in marriage to Thorn, from the powerful Dragon clan. Ophelia must leave her family and follow her fiancée to the floating capital on the distant Ark of the Pole. There, in the presence of her enigmatic future husband, Ophelia slowly realises that she is a pawn in a political game that will have far-reaching ramifications not only for her but for her entire world.
My review
A Winter’s Promise by Christelle Dabos follows the story of Ophelia, a young woman with psychometric abilities, as she is wedded to someone from the Dragon Clan on the Pole. She has to leave her beloved museum and homeland behind to the frozen courts of the Pole, where she quickly gets trapped in a corrupt court filled with intrigue and deceit.
Surrounded by strangers in a culture she doesn’t know, her environment sculpted by the illusion-crafting Mirages, and trapped in an engagement with a cold, calculating man who has no time or love for her, Ophelia has to stay alive, no matter what happens.
When I was rummaging through the local library, the intriguing cover of a floating castle stood out to me. After the first few chapters, the worldbuilding intrigued me. A world torn asunder, split up into dozens of different mini countries called arks, each led by a powerful and immortal family spirit that passed down their abilities to their descendants. This results in various Clans on every ark, each specialising in different abilities.
While, admittedly, the incest in all of this concerned me (Ophelia calls everyone on her island aunt, uncle, nephew, or niece because they’re all related), especially since marriages between arks are stated to be incredibly rare, it was easy enough to ignore when not thinking about it too hard. Though I do wonder how they all got different abilities. A lot of things are never quite explained, and it leaves me so curious.
It’s also a shame that the plot, which seemed like a great romance-less twist on the arranged marriage stories, turned into a “will they, won’t they?” in the end. It could’ve been much stronger if there was more queer rep, with Ophelia being openly aromantic and asexual, Thorn aro/ace as well, and Archibald aromantic. That guy has “aromantic” written all over him, I tell you.
There’s also the fact that the only person of colour in the entire book is hit with an assassination attempt within a few pages, after which she’s promptly returned to being in the shadows. While she does survive, it was off-putting to me. All in all, the diversity in this book is something I found lacking.
One thing to note is that the story moves incredibly slowly because Ophelia is thrust into a passive role. From the beginning, it’s made clear that she has no say in anything that happens to her. A marriage is arranged for her against her will, she has to leave her homeland within a day of meeting him, she’s not allowed to leave the estate once on the Pole, and she’s abused and belittled. It’s… very hard to read. When Ophelia does do something on her own accord, it’s punished so harshly that she loses any remaining agency.
This passivity is especially present when Ophelia is in the court. For over half the book, she is forced to be mute, a silent observer. The narrative highlights repeatedly she’s like a piece of furniture, unseen and unnoticed. This rings quite true. Even though she’s playing mute, she could’ve used her facial expression a lot more, or communicated through body language or even sign language. As it stands now, it feels like the story happens to the main character, and she only barely reacts to it.
Another concern is how the characters in the novel are described. Each character is only given a handful of things that define them, and these things are reiterated throughout the entire book, sometimes multiple times within the same scene. Ophelia is small, has black curls, and whispers. Thorn, her fiance, is incredibly tall, has blade-like eyes, and doesn’t like to speak. Rosalinde, her uncle, has horse-like teeth. Archibald, the Pole ambassador, is dressed in tattered clothing but has the most charming smile.
These facts are repeated so often that the characters feel flat, like caricatures or stereotypes. There’s very little beyond them aside from the things that are repeated over and over. They react in ways that don’t make sense or stick to their pre-determined role even when the situation calls for a different response. It would’ve been so much more interesting to see different facets of all of them and why they do what they do.
Personally, I didn’t enjoy reading the book much. While the set-up was promising, the plot was slow, the characters flat, and the main character has no autonomy. In fact, she’s verbally, emotionally, and physically abused the whole book, and promptly forgives her worst abuser after she very uncharacteristically breaks down and spills her past, because “how can you hate a woman whose children were killed?” However, to each their own – this may very well resonate with others than me.
Content warnings
Severe abuse
Throughout the story, Ophelia is belittled, her opinion and choices don’t matter, she’s hurt both physically and internally (through magic), she’s refused rest and treatment when ill, she’s beaten and imprisoned, she’s treated as lesser, and she’s completely isolated from other people. This starts back at home but continues throughout the entire novel.
Sexual harassment, mentions of rape and sexual assault
Women on the Pole are lesser than men, and Ophelia is sexually harassed, intimidated, and more. She’s also been touched inappropriately a few times, though nothing beyond a cheek caress and forcefully being led somewhere private by a man intending to hit on her.
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