I think historical fiction novels with a dash of supernatural elements are what will save me from my reading slumps.

This is not a book to tear through quickly, you need to take your time and to be honest, Katherine Arden deserves that because you can tell she took hers.

This book jumped out to me because I will read ANYTHING to do with ghosts but when I saw Arden’s name on the cover, I knew I was in for a good time. The story follows siblings as they attempt to find their way back to each other (without losing themselves) in the throes of World War 1.

You get history, you get myth, you get spirits, you get a range of feelings from fear to hope to love. I just really loved this book. Another great story from Katherine Arden.

This was my first Katherine Arden book, but won't be my last. It was so wonderfully written, and I felt all the feelings. This story follows Laura, a nurse in WWI, who finds out her brother is missing in the war. She returns to the war, after initially being injured and sent back home,to find out what happened to her brother. She meets old friends and follows clues, some of which are purely fantastical and can't possibly be true, all to find out what happened to Freddie.

Katherine Arden’s work, The Warm Hands of Ghosts, is a powerful and emotional exploration of war and trauma that will resonate with readers. It is haunting in its realistic portrayal of World War I and the devastation the war wrought on soldiers and civilians alike. Katherine Arden brings the time period to life with rich depth and amazing details that will grab readers attention. But it is the characters that will keep you reading.
Both Freddie, in his pain and his connection to the soldier Winter will move you almost to tears as you hope he can find a way to move past his pain and find happiness. And Laura, as she searches for Freddie, is a strong and charismatic voice, compelling and vivid. I love the secondary characters as well, Mary, Dr. Jones, and Pim. All of the characters have depth and a complexity that will make you feel like they are real people to you. Of course, Mary is a historical figure. I especially love the Parkey sisters at the beginning of the novel, they feel very much like a stand-in for the 3 wise women or the Morai of Greek mythology. In either case, I found them fascinating. The story truly explores the price of war, the ghosts that haunt us and loss. It is a beautiful dark story that is powerful and emotional.
If you like dark stories based in history with rich details, ghosts, and the idea of loss and war, this novel is compelling and dynamic. The characters are rich in depth and resonated with me. I love the resolution, that while not perfect, still gave hope in the end. If you like powerful and emotional stories, I highly recommend you check this novel out.

I was a big fan of Katherine Arden’s WINTERNIGHT TRILOGY and ended my review of that series by saying I was greatly looking forward to seeing what she did next. Well, what’s next is The Warm Hands of Ghosts, a standalone historical novel set in the horrors of WWI that happily mostly maintains the high bar of quality Arden set with that earlier trilogy, though I had a few issues with some elements. Minor spoilers to follow, though I’d say all are heavily foreshadowed early on and thus aren’t really spoilery.

Arden’s narrative follows two plotlines, both set toward the end of WWI though slightly separated in time. In one, beginning in January 1918, former battlefront nurse Laura Iven has been living back home in Halifax, Novia Scotia after being discharged with a medal and a serious injury. Early on in the book, she receives a box containing some personal items of her brother Freddie, who was serving in Belgium and is not missing and presumed dead. For various reasons, though, Laura believes Freddie may still be alive, but even if that remains unlikely, she wants to learn more about what may have happened to him. She thus heads back to the front along with two other women: Mary Borden, who runs a private hospital behind the lines, and Penelope Shaw (“Pim”), whose son has also gone missing in Belgium.

The other timeline (begun some months before in November 1917) follows Freddie, who is not dead but had been buried below ground in an exploded German pillbox along with a wounded German named Winter. The two eventually make their way back above ground but get separated after a harrowing journey back to “civilization”. Freddie (who in name and poetic bent may be meant to echo Wilfred Owen, the young poet who died in the War) takes apparent refuge with a mysterious fiddler named Faland, who appears periodically to soldiers who can enter his surprisingly intact and posh hotel, with his strange violin music and a mirror said to show those who look into it their deepest desire.

As the novel moves forward, the two plots eventually converge as Laura seeks out Freddie on the warfront (encountering Faland as well), and Freddie sinks ever deeper into the isolating and life-draining “refuge” of Faland’s hotel. Whether Laura will find Freddie in time is the driving force of the novel, and it remains a tense question throughout.

That overriding tension is one of the many strengths of the book. Another is Arden’s grimly vivid and sometimes lyrical depiction of the WWI hellscape, whether describing the trenches, the blasted-out land, the ruins, the wounds, the infuriating dichotomy between the soldiers in the field and their leaders in the châteaus sending them out to die, and more. Calling it a “hellscape” is semi-literal here, as Arden uses the surreal nature of the war, as well as its otherworldly nature, to graft her more supernatural elements onto the story. Often called the first “modern” war, WWI marked a turning point from one world into another, though one that is less a step through a doorway from the old to the new and more a layering over, for a while, of the two together, one atop the other. It was, after all, a war where soldiers in plumed hats rode horses at the same time other soldiers crept forward inside tanks, where infantry with bayonets marched in close order against machine guns, where the skies were filled with airplanes dropping bombs and also passenger pigeons carrying communications. Add in the miles upon miles of trenches and barbed wire, the craters from artillery, and the green clouds of mustard gas and “surreal”/”hellish” doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Pulling off one of my favorite elements of fantasy — making the metaphoric literal — Arden drops into this landscape (minor spoiler to follow) the one character who would (perhaps) feel at home. I call this a minor spoiler because I’d say it’s made pretty clear early on who Faland is meant to be, to the reader if not the characters. Even, I’d argue in a minor quibble, a little too clear too early, with his mismatched eyes lighting up “with unholy laughter,” his fiddle on which he plays “flawless music,” his “damned mirror,” and his name that, depending on one’s pronunciation, could be read as either “Foul Land” or “Fey Land.” Not to mention of course the chapter titles from Paradise Lost and The Book of Revelation. Beyond the unnecessarily (and unsuccessful) coyness regarding his true nature, Faland slots nicely into the same type of immortal creature we saw in the WINTERNIGHT trilogy with the Frost King Morozko. Not that the two are similar as characters but in the way Arden does such a great job, and sadly a relatively rare one, of presenting these immortal beings as truly different from you and I rather than simply long-lived humans. Faland is not, nor should he be, “relatable,” nor is he truly understandable. Just a fey being should be.

The scenes with Faland and Freddie are easily my favorite: for the surreal, fantastical nature of them; for the intensity of Freddie’s guilt and shame and fear; for the unholy bargain he considers that is, unlike Faland, wholly understandable even as it is also horrific and tragic; for the ever increasing dread and tension; and finally for the thematic question at their core: what do our traumas make of us and are we ourselves if we choose to give them up?

The scenes with Laura share a similar theme of loss, guilt, and trauma, of being haunted by the past (and here again Arden literalizes the metaphor), though they didn’t quite land with the same impact as Freddie’s storyline. Part of it is her story feels more external than internal. Another part is things fall in line a bit too easily for you, possible obstacles slid out of the way sometimes before they even arise, as when she needs to get back to the front, and she’s given a method immediately via Mary Borden. Similar easings of her path occur, but I won’t go into detail so as to avoid spoilers.

Epic adventure that proves that love really can concur all. Set during WWI this story is told from two different story lines. It follows a war nurse named Laura she travels through the war torn country in search of her missing brother Freddie after receiving a package containing his laundered military uniform. Being told that he is dead Laura refuses to believe that her beloved brother is truly gone. She sets out to find out what happened to Freddie. The second story line follows Freddie as he is trapped within no man's land with an unlikely friend who is supposed to be his enemy.

Laura is desperately seeking her brother, Freddie, whose effects have been returned to her during WWI. Hampered by an injury she is still recovering from and the fact that she is a woman and has to follow certain rules, she accepts a job at a private hospital to make it back to the front lines of the war. Meanwhile, Freddie is on his own journey back to his sister after being trapped in a pillbox bunker with a strange German soldier during a bombing.

Slightly spooky, but not quite spooky enough for me? I picked this book up because it was written by Katherine Arden, whose Small Spaces quartet was an amazing middle grade horror series. I think I expected more of that from this book, where everything seems to be muted and demure. There are ghosts, there is a strange, somewhat evil hotelier that likes to trap people in his ghostly hotel...but the stakes just seem so...low? I don't know. I really enjoyed the book, but I put it down, not to sound like Michelle Visage scolding drag queens, I wanted MORE. More spook. More ghosts. Just...more.

I think this might be more of a me problem and not the book problem? I tend to pick up books in a couple eras (WW1, Victorian, Edwardian) because they sound amazing and then I don't like them or am mildly disappointed for no discernable reason. Not because they're bad books, but because I just...don't like the eras those books are set in. If you like books set during WWI, you'll probably really enjoy this.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts exists in liminal spaces, straddling the tenuous border between reality and fantasy, life and death, historical and speculative fiction. It is a story that grapples for scraps of humanity amongst the wreckage of war. A story in which the characters desperately pine for a miracle yet must settle for tattered vestiges of hope. Because hope, fleeting though it may be, persists.

But what if the salvation you sought turned out to be a greater hell than the one from which you were plucked? What if your savior is leech? A fiend?

Proust who? Katherine Arden has rebranded the persistence of memory. Those dogged, unflagging memories of sun-kissed skin, the sea breeze in one’s hair, and the explosion of glass that still knocks the breath out of you. Peaceful, quotidian remembrances plague the characters, their spent happiness rendered in stark contrast against their new reality. Yet for some, salvation is found in the contours of memory.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a haunting. It is characters who have seemingly lost everything, running from ghosts and running to ghosts. It is the specter of possibility. It is hope, desperate, keening hope daring to wend its way in and settle into the brain and lingering against all sense.

Not all casualties of war are dead. Warm hands of ghosts, indeed.

Thank you a thousand times, ROBIN KATHERINE DEL REY for the gifted book package and the opportunity to participate in the Fiend group chat. Understanding each reference and each little detail made me love and appreciate this book even more.

I'm a big fan of the Winternight trilogy so I was really looking forward to this one and, as expected, Katherine's writing is excellent.

TWHOG is completely different from Winternight, being set after WW I and following Laura, a combat nurse, and her brother Freddie, a soldier. The book doesn't shy away from the horrors of war and how it impacts on the various people involved, making you really feel for the characters, particularly Freddie whose chapters were my favourite to read. There was a supernatural aspect included which I thought was really interesting and which didn't detract from the bleakness of the situation.

While I did enjoy many elements of the book, at the end I felt I just wanted a little bit more from it as everything wrapped up a little too quickly. I didn't necessarily think romance needed to feature and I didn't mind that it did generally, but I just would have liked it to be developed a bit more.

Overall, while the ending might not have been exactly what I wanted, I still really enjoyed reading Arden's prose again. I do think this book will appeal to a lot of people, and I'll look forward to whatever Katherine writes next.

Thanks so much to @centurybooksuk for the ARC and to @delreybooks and @netgalley for the eARC

Katherine Arden is one of those special authors whose writing will always find a way to reach out its hands to readers, glide its way up your arms, and burrows its way into your chest. This book scraped me raw, poked at my tender flesh until I cried and by the end, soothed my aches with salves and hope.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts takes you the harsh and heartbreaking realities of WWI through the eyes of a nurse and her brother, a soldier. It’s a dark, heavy journey for Laura as she pieces together the path to finding her missing brother. Katherine Arden does not shy away from loss and fully invites readers to witness the grief and devastation war causes, but twists reality with paranormal aspects that elevates the story into something curious. A mystery that you will not be able to resist following and trying to solve.

And while it may seem like this book is out to devastate you, it’s not. By the end of it, you realize that, ultimately, Laura and Freddie’s story is one of hope and love. Both are fueled with their love for each other, and we are witnesses to how far they will go to be reunited. It’s truly a journey worth experiencing.

Absolutely beautiful. Time slipped away while I was reading it and I loved it all. "The hands of ghosts are warm" is something I never thought about but how true it is.

This book took me by surprise, I’m not really a big historical fiction reader but this sounded so good so I had to give it a shot and surprisingly I loved it!

I read this book in a single day. I couldn’t put it down, I was so invested in these characters and their stories.

Overall, a wonderfully haunting story that makes me want to pick up more of this authors works.

Well, drat. This isn’t the review I wanted to be writing for this book.

I loved Katherine Arden’s Bear and the Nightingale trilogy and also greatly enjoyed the first book in the Small Spaces series. I’m bummed and surprised to report that this book did very little for me.

Arden’s writing is as lovely as ever, which of course goes a long way toward making an otherwise unappealing story more readable. It just wasn’t enough to save this one, even if it allows for moments of appreciation for the author’s talents.

I understand from the author’s note what Arden was attempting to do here, but I’m not sure it was a successful endeavor. This is mostly a horrors of war novel, which isn’t exactly rare, and the magical element feels like both an afterthought and a disappointment. Though there were flashes of potential (particularly early in the story when we first encounter our mysterious stranger), the magic lacks both the originality and the sparkly, evocative quality that has made Arden’s other work such a delight to read.

I’ll continue to eagerly await new offerings from Arden, who I suspect has many more good books in her. But I recommend skipping this one.

What is it about?

Laura Iven is a nurse injured in WWI. Shortly after losing her parents in an explosion she gets news that her brother has died on the front. The 3 little ladies that she is staying with tell her that isn’t true and she needs to go back and find him.

Meanwhile, you hear her brother’s story.
Told kind of like a Christopher Nolan movie, the time lines happen at different paces until they finally merge together near the climax.

Was it good?
Yes! Freddie’s time line jumps right in with on the edge of your seat tension. His story is like a bad nightmare that is told so beautifully you can picture it.

Laura’s point of view is a little slower and more thoughtful. She’s resistant to the mystical elements in her life, but she’s willing to do anything to find her brother.

The story has so many thought provoking parts and pieces. I had many interesting conversations with my people about similar hypothetical situations.

I strongly recommend this book for fans of historical fiction, ghosts, devils, war, or Katherine Arden

I left my review on Story Graph, Goodreads, and Amazon.

All I can say is that this book is a monster book!!!
And by that, I mean, it has the author’s soul all over it. Have you ever read a book that you knew was incredibly considered and meant so much to the author. For instance, many authors, arguably most, would say that they put their blood, sweat, and tears into their project, and you might believe them based on the sheer challenge of writing anything for any length of time. In Ghosts, you feel the impact of the writer’s care in every word, the punctuation, and every decision.
The flow of the book was like riding a gentle wave toward shore where you know you’re safe, moving toward the shore at a precise speed that will effortlessly land you in exactly the place you cared to end up the whole time. That is my experience with this book. Such a work of art, and what a story and oh my I will rave on.
My absolute favourite in a very, very long time.
Maybe I’m just in the mood for this type of novel set in this time and these places, with these characters, what can I say, it just worked for me on all levels and I think it’s going to work for a lot of people.

Thanks to netgalley or providing me with this ARC!

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a book that changed something foundational in my brain, in how I see the world. Katherine Arden's stories of Laura and Freddie and Winter and Pim showed the inhumanity of war and the uncertainty of a changing world in clear, relatable, horrifying ways.

This book was violent and scary and beautiful and intelligent and amazing. I finished it in two days because I could not put it down. I'm torn between wanting to write paragraph after paragraph of praise and wanting to tell you just to go read the book. Do it. Let it live in your brain and illuminate how you look at humanity.

Thank you to NetGalley, Katherine Arden, and Del Rey for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Book Name: The Warm Hands of Ghosts
Author: Katherine Arden

ARC
Thank you to Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Del Rey and NetGalley for an ARC of The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden

Stars: 1
Spice: 0

Historical Fantasy
“Gothic”

Thoughts
- PTSD
- Graphic Depictions of Injury
- Horror > Gothic
- “Unreliable Narrator Vibes”

Darker and far more depressing than expected and the opening was mildly confusing. The descriptions of violence were just gratuitous, since Laura, out FMC, was unable to do process it due to her PTSD. The Gothic “vibes” of this felt more in line with a typical horror movie than a gothic crimson peak. (Hopefully that makes sense.) The exploration of PTSD would have been interesting but it just felt depressing. Overall this book just wasn't what I expected and therefore wasn't the best read for me.

Due to the Negative Nature of this review, I will not be posting it to Goodreads or retail sites with respect to the publisher and author.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC! "The Warm Hands of Ghosts" by Katherine Arden is a gripping and haunting tale set amidst the backdrop of World War I, following the poignant journey of Laura Iven, a combat nurse searching for her missing brother amidst the chaos of war. Arden's vivid prose immerses readers in the stark realities of the battlefield, where hope dwindles and desperation reigns supreme. Interwoven with Laura's story is the gripping narrative of her brother Freddie, trapped in a life-or-death struggle with a German soldier. Through their harrowing experiences, Arden explores themes of loss, resilience, and the enduring bond of family amidst the turmoil of war. "The Warm Hands of Ghosts" is a powerful and evocative portrayal of the human spirit in the face of adversity, leaving a lasting impact on the reader's heart and mind.

Here's the thing: I think I really struggle with historical fiction. This wasn't solely historical fiction; it definitely had a fantasy/folklore aspect to it, but I would say the primary genre was historical fiction (perhaps alternative history?). The whole first half of this book, I kept wanting to love it, but just really struggled to feel engaged. However, the second half of the book definitely did sell me on how smart and beautiful of a book this is!! I'm really glad that I stuck with it.

Katherine Arden is a fantastic writer and I was frequently in awe of her way with words. Freddie's journey in the book was truly something special. The symbolism in his journey of losing himself in his war experiences and then needing to work so hard to find a way back to himself felt like a profound illustration of a veteran with PTSD. I also felt the concept of how our stories (positive or negative) are the things that create our sense of self was so powerful.

I was also really taken in by the author's note at the end of the book; I love to hear how and why a book was created. This was outside of my comfort zone but I am so glad that I read it!

(This review was posted on my Instagram account on 2/15/2024).

A haunting, tragic story of war and unconditional love, this book easily became a 5-Star read. Whether its wartime Halifax or an unknown French battlefield, Arden does an incredible job transporting us there, and we're experiencing the story as if we're right alongside the characters. Our main characters have their own voices, and complex emotions are rarely portrayed as well as they are in this story.
Laura is a complicated heroine, which is really refreshing after reading so many historical fictions about saintlike women. She feels she is an unlikable woman, but we see that though she is stern and sometimes reckless, she is very compassionate, determined, and able to overcome her biggest fears for those she loves, especially her brother.
Freddie, while young and inexperienced in the world, provides such a sense of hope that makes it impossible to not root for him in every arena. He is clever and naive and optimistic and worrisome all at once, providing a well-rounded look at a young man's coming-of-age in a war torn world.
This story gives brilliant accounts of overcoming loss, living with PTSD, finding hope in the darkest of times, and so much more, while seamlessly incorporating the paranormal aspect that is often associated with war.
I received an advanced reader copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

I loved everything about this book, from the detailed history and setting (World War I Belgium and Halifax, Canada) to its beautiful but haunting story. It was the perfect blend of historical fiction and fantasy. I was already a big fan of Katherine Arden’s Winternight trilogy, but this book is very different from her other ones, and apparently it’s a book that took her a long time to write. It’s worth the wait.

In 1918, Laura is a war nurse who’s been discharged with a leg injury. She arrives home to Halifax when a ship (the SS Mont-Blanc) explodes in the harbor. The ship was full of high explosives and the explosion killed nearly 1,800 people, and blowing out a large sector of buildings in Halifax. Laura loses both of her parents in the tragedy. Then, weeks later, she receives a box with the uniform and dog tags of her brother Freddie, but no explanation of what happened to him. Not knowing if he’s dead or alive, she returns to the front, determined to find out.

We get both Freddie’s and Laura’s perspectives in this story, only Freddie’s story begins a few months earlier, in the Battle of Passchendaele. As their stories converge, both Freddie and Laura hear about a mysterious man known as “the fiddler”. The soldiers say that once you’ve entered his bar, drank his liquor and heard his music, you’ll never want to leave, and you’ll spend the rest of your life trying to get back. Of course, amidst the horrors of war, this is only one more strange story going around, and it seems pretty understandable that the soldiers would want to be anywhere other than where they are.

Laura and Freddie are great characters, as are the friends they make in their journeys. Laura is so strong and determined, but she’s also haunted by the memory of her mother’s death, who was alone in their house in Halifax’s harbor. She also struggles with her physical injuries from the war, including scarred hands from nerve gas. Freddie is haunted by the things he’s done in the war. As Arden tells the story, it seems like basic right and wrong gets turned around in war, where you’re forced to kill innocent people, betray friends, and fleeing means you’ll get shot by a firing squad.

I won’t tell you more about the story. I loved the vivid, atmospheric writing and the way the fantastic elements just blended seamlessly with the history (war is already such a strange, unimaginable environment). It reminded me at times of the first Wonder Woman movie, the way it was horrific and beautiful at the same time. I also loved the way Arden slowly builds the relationships that Freddie and Laura develop over the course of the story.

The book is named for a World War I memoir, Ghosts Have Warm Hands, by Will R. Bird, a soldier in Canada’s Black Watch from 1916-1919. In this memoir Bird describes several experiences where he was guided to safety by the ghost of his brother, who died early in the war.

I want to share what Arden says about this book on Goodreads:

Ghosts is a book about love and loss, how the world ends, and how it goes on. It’s about the nature of evil and the shape of hell, and about war. I started it in 2019, and here it is coming out in 2024, when young men are fighting in trenches in Europe once again. Perhaps enjoy is the wrong word for the book I spent a long time calling the Fiend. But I hope it haunts you, as it has haunted me.

Katherine Arden
Note: I received an advanced review copy from NetGalley and publisher Del Rey. This book published February 13, 2024.