On the not-so-positive side, I didn’t much like Liesl or the petulant, demanding, erratic way she conducts herself around people who love her. The Erlkonig is a strong romantic interest on the one hand, but on the other, it’s clear that staying with him will slowly drain away her life. Her husband offers her complete freedom to play and write music, but there is no audience-she is confined to the Underground. Here, Liesl escapes the clutches of her family, but moves into another stifling situation. The issue of having to give up personal dreams to take family responsibility seems to be a common theme from Asian women writers. On the positive side, Jones has put together a really promising plot. It’s not very Asian, but somehow I haven’t heard a peep about cultural appropriation. According to the Erlkonig legend, the bride gives up her life and retires to the Underground to make sure spring comes to the world above. The story is set in the 1800s when touring violinists were the rock stars of the era. Jones has used the German legend of the Erlkonig as the basis for her story, with some other allusions drawn from European culture and the movie Labyrinth. Can Liesl save her sister by giving up her own life? Because Liesl has rejected him, he takes Kathe instead. Then the Goblin King comes for his bride. As a child, she finds a boy in the woods who calls himself the Goblin King, and they promise to marry, but as Liesl grows older, she has to give up her dreams to take responsibility for her family. Liesl wants to study music, too, and dreams of being a composer, but her father only lets her play accompaniment to her brother. Liesl is the middle child, dark and plain, while her older sister Kathe is blond and beautiful and her younger brother Josef is a violin virtuoso. There’s a sequel coming in 2018 called Shadowsong. Jones is Asian, a native of Los Angeles, and this looks to be her first published novel. It was published through Thomas Dunn Books/Macmillan in February of 2017. This book is part of my effort to review minority authors.

Wintersong goodreads