Kiss of Frost and Flame
The Cossack invasion of Siberia in 1581 is the militaristic and cross-cultural backdrop for this fascinating novel. It is a land inhabited and traversed by many different groups of people for many different reasons. Native tribes like the Samoyeds were nomadic reindeer herders, Tatars were Muslim inhabitants under the leadership of a khan, and the Cossacks were sent in by the Russian tsar Ivan the Terrible to first trade with and then subjugate the indigenous groups.
This novel narrates the events of the earliest Cossack incursions through the eyes of a Samoyed woman and a Russian man. The Samoyed woman, Umey, whose name means “kiss” in her native language, is herself the offspring of a Samoyed father and a Russian mother. Her appearance is not fully Samoyed because of her distinctive blue eyes that make her a “half breed” and outcast, but also a potential inspiration in a time of crisis. Her counterpart, Alexey, is an honorable Russian man snatched from a scaffold for his valuable prior army experience. He is sent to Siberia with the Cossacks, where his and Umey’s paths cross throughout various life-threatening encounters.
Characters seemingly larger than life by their endurance of hardships inhabit these pages. Cycles of unending danger provide readers with an extremely fast-paced storyline. The northern landscape is experienced viscerally through physical descriptions of sights, sounds, and smells. Native appeals to Mother Earth and Russian words for tribute by fur, for example, that are embedded in the dialogue, further heighten the dramatic sense of place and time. This novel will resonate strongly with readers interested in early Russian history.
