Katherine Arden—the author of the Small Spaces quartet and The Winternight Trilogy—has returned to adult fantasy with her latest novel, The Warm Hands of Ghost. Set during World War 1, the story is a superb, devastating, and meticulously plotted historical novel with a dark (and thrilling) fantasy twist.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is split between the perspectives of two siblings: Laura Iven, a combat nurse honorably discharged, and Freddie, a soldier who, early in the story, is assumed dead.

This book is a challenging read. Anything set during a war typically is, particularly in World War 1 and 2 as well as any of the conflicts that are part of real world history. But Arden doesn’t use it simply as set dressing. The author draws the conflict closer with stark imagery, detailed writing that immerses the reader, and by making it intrinsically personal to the characters.

Laura’s position as a combat nurse put her up close and personal with the wounded, the fighting, and the horror. She was cynical but also caring, skilled at nursing, and desperate for information about her only remaining family. Freddie’s experience is just as harrowing, and that was especially true of his time in the overturned pillbox and the events afterwards—it forever changes him. Even the secondary characters—for example Mrs. Shaw—are touched by the conflict, although they process their grief in different ways (and it spurs different actions). And that’s what makes each member of the cast standout.

The speculative aspects were excellent. They’re in a like vein to The Winter of the Witch, fitting seamlessly with the setting and themes. It was a period of change, and that too had to adapt to the times. And the result was an eerie, terrifying, and clever antagonist.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is part ghost story and part story of survival. It’s also about family, loss, change, and hope; a tale that was intense and dark, and an incredibly emotional read. And I loved every second of it.

Disclaimer: this copy of the book was provided by the publisher (Del Rey) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

The writing is top-notch and the story feels meaningful. Dropping five stars here, but I stopped at 3% and ordered the Waterstones special edition copy with sprayed edges. I’m going to wait to read it until I have the gorgeous physical copy in hand. :-)

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

This was a beautifully languid trudge through the forgotten horrors of WWI. I’m at a loss really. Katherine Arden has some of my favorite prose, and as usual she manages to create a haunting atmosphere that settles deep down in your bones. It’s lyrical and all-consuming to the point where I forget I’m reading. I’m there in the trenches, in the darkness, in the devastation.

It’s not for the faint of heart. At all. There are a lot of terrors explored in the story – worse, they’re real terrors that were undoubtedly experienced by thousands of real soldiers and nurses and civilians. But somehow she weaves a single thread, pulling you through it all – one of hope and life, even in the face of the unspeakable.

The characters felt real and raw; Laura, a wounded nurse returning to Belgium in search of the truth about her brother, and that brother, Freddie, a soldier trying to survive the trenches with Winter, his unlikely German ally. My heart ached for each and every one of them. And I was glad a smidge of romance was eventually thrown into the story, it was a welcomed breath of fresh air amidst all the gloom.

Then there’s “the fiddler,” a mysterious musician wandering the warfront, providing a refuge for those looking to escape their own waking nightmare. His role in particular got me thinking. And will probably continue to make me think. PTSD, grief, survival, the blurred lines between good and evil, and what it even means to be alive are all explored so thoughtfully and authentically.

I was mesmerized from the first page until the last.

Since finishing Katherine Arden’s Winternight Trilogy a few years ago, I’ve been eagerly awaiting word of what her next novel would be and when it would be available. At last, the wait is over with The Warm Hands of Ghosts available soon. Exploring the psychological impact and devastation of World War I with the inclusion of fantasy elements, The Warm Hands of Ghosts proved to be worth the wait. Despite the heavy subject matter, there is a thread of hopefulness that runs through the novel, preventing it from going too dark and yet, the novel’s climactic scenes and resolution anchor it in the harsh realities of war, maintaining a delicate balance.

In late 1917, Laura Iven returned home to Halifax after being wounded as a battlefield nurse but her homecoming didn’t go as planned. First, her parents were among the fatalities of the infamous explosion that all but leveled Halifax. A little over a month later Laura received her younger brother’s effects from the front where he was declared missing, suspected killed in action. But if he were truly missing, how had they gotten his coat and tags to return them to her? Unable to get a clear answer about what exactly had happened and having been told by her spiritualist employers that Freddie was actually alive (even though she doesn’t believe in that sort of thing), Laura and a friend join a volunteer hospital organization and she goes back to Belgium to try and discover the truth of what happened to her brother. What she and her friend find as they near the front are rumors of a man the soldiers call the fiddler who provides a bit of respite from the horrors of war and that some men go mad looking for him again along with the gentle oblivion he offers… and Laura learns the fiddler might have something to do with what happened to Freddie.

Understandably, grief permeates The Warm Hands of Ghosts. It’s interesting that a novel about World War I begins with an incident of so much death that isn’t a major battle. Instead, it’s almost as far from the front as it’s possible to get and yet, it too happens because of the war – the explosion being due to the munitions load carried by one of the ships in the collision. Even having grown up among the lore of the Halifax explosion (because to this day, Halifax sends Boston a Christmas tree in thanks for the city’s support), it wasn’t until reading this novel that the timeline truly clicked into place. At the same time Laura is processing the grief of her parents’ deaths (and the guilt over not having been able to do more to save her mother), she is surrounded by the grief of others. The elderly sisters she works for are spiritualists who hold seances and try to connect grieving widows and families with their husbands, brothers and sons who died fighting an ocean away. But because of this there is an optimism and hope running through that grief that manages to penetrate even Laura’s battlefield-bred cynicism and pragmatism.

Back near the fighting, the grief settles like a fog over everyone involved but it is less directly tied to death and much more abstract. There’s grief for the world as it was and for the sense of self, both of which appear more difficult to work through because there is less understanding for what the grieving process should look like – there doesn’t exist the same template to follow that can carry you safely to the other side and a future that, while different, is recognizable. So much of The Warm Hands of Ghosts explores navigating through that sea of grief and uncertainty. Do you seek to numb the pain or take it out on others? Do you find someone to blame, even if it’s yourself? Do you try to deny what you’re feeling or distract yourself? Let it drive you to be productive (or self-destructive)? And how do you know for sure that you’re on the other side or is there no other side and you’re just stuck in that sea forever? (Despite so much time spent on such dark questions, I found The Warm Hands of Ghosts to actually be quite hopeful and satisfying in many respects.)

The Warm Hands of Ghosts will be available February 13, 2024.

Selected by the Washington Post as one of ten “noteworthy” books to read in February, Katherine Arden takes the reader to the hellscape of 1917 Belgium during World War I and the Third Battle of Ypres. Laura Iven, a seasoned combat nurse, was discharged from the Canadian Nursing Corps in Flanders when a shell casing lodged deep in her leg crippling her. She returns home and is hired by the Parley sisters, a “delightful trio of swindlers,” to serve as a nurse companion, but an explosion in the harbor in Halifax that kills her parents and destroys the family home derails her plans.

While Laura tends to the injured at a YMCA hospital in Nova Scotia, her younger brother, Freddie, is serving in the Canadian army in the trenches near Ypres. A harbor clerk prior to the war who “wrote wretched poems and drew good pictures,” Freddy finds himself in an upended pillbox with a grievously wounded German soldier, Hans Winter. The need for companionship to escape the misery in which they are trapped makes the fact that they are enemy combatants irrelevant. Freddie recognizes that he would have “died a dozen times if not for Winter” and, as they escape the pillbox and find themselves behind Canadian lines, Freddie takes actions “in traitorous defense of the enemy.”

Months later, Laura receives a box containing Freddie’s uniform jacket, identity tags, and other odds and ends, and a mysterious postcard which reads, “I will bring him back if I can. If I don’t, and the war is over, you must ask. . . .” The rest was blotted by a stain. Determined to find out what had happened to her brother, and urged on by Agatha Parley who assures Laura that her brother is alive and that she must go to him, Laura returns to the front accompanied by the beautiful and refined widow Penelope Shaw or Pim, a client of the Parleys whose son died in the war, and Mary Borden, the founder of a private aid station in the early days of the war housed at an abandoned chateau in Belgian.

Intertwined with the grief and heartbreak of war which Arden meticulously renders, is a supernatural element, a hotelier by the name of Falange, who steals his patrons’ souls. This demon ups the ante by providing a threat that is as strange and intense as the emotions of the characters involved in the world at war. Thank you Net Galley and Del Rey for providing me with an advance copy of this historical fantasy.

This was stunning and haunting. While still historical fantasy, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a pivot for Katherine Arden, after her Winternight trilogy. Her new standalone is not a fairytale but instead more grounded in the horrific realities of World War I, combined with a story of ghosts and a supernatural, perhaps devilish figure known as Faland.

The story follows Laura Iven, a tough, no-nonsense combat nurse returning to the front in search of her missing brother Freddie. Laura is already grieving her mother and determined to find out if her brother has died or gone missing in some other way. Meanwhile, her brother Freddie is left near death with a German soldier named Winter, whom he teams up with to escape and attempt to survive. Freddie and Winter form a bond that transcends their countries and determine to save each other, even after Freddie falls into Faland's mysterious orbit for months. Laura and Freddie deal with deep trauma after serving on the front for most of the war, the devastating explosion in their hometown of Halifax, and the things they have been forced to see and do.

Arden's writing is filled with authentic language and lesser known historical detail - the Halifax disaster, Mary Borden's independent hospital, the women who served abroad as nurses, and more - while remaining in her typical lyrical, sometimes mysterious style. This book is far more eerie, though, and the fantastical elements are as haunting as the realities of the true time and place.

“Ghosts have warm hands, he kept telling me, as though it was the greatest secret in the world.”

I thought Katherine Arden did a beautiful job weaving present with past, reality with magic, the horrors of war with the horror of something fantastical preying on the soldiers and officers alike. In some ways the characters were not well-fleshed out; we know almost nothing of Winter’s past, of who Pim really is, of Laura before the war. But to some extent, isn’t that the point? Isn’t the whole story about losing pieces of yourself until you are distilled down into something that survived and then figuring out if you can move beyond survival?

The plot moved very slowly, which I didn’t mind, and was at times a bit repetitive, which I enjoyed less. But overall this was a gripping, emotional, bittersweet story. I thought it was well written and unique.

I was lucky enough to receive an ARC. I loved this story and couldn’t put it down. It flew by so quickly. The writing was quite frankly beautiful and really lent itself to the magical realism narrative.

I will say though that the characters are not at all developed which may bother a lot of people.
Could the characters and plot be more developed? Absolutely. And I wish it was.

This very much reads like a fairytale where the characters are just moving along and learning and being changed as a person. however it really worked for me regardless of that. And that’s coming from someone who loves slow-burn narratives with developed characters.

Honestly, I love Katherine Arden’s work and I absolutely have her on auto-buy. I can’t wait to reread the Winternight trilogy later this month.

Katherine Arden
The Warm Hands of Ghosts

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book had me happy, sad, mad, worried, scared! All of it! I have never read a historical fiction like this! Well done.

About: During the Great War, a combat nurse searches for her brother, believed dead in the trenches despite eerie signs that suggest otherwise.

Favorite Character: Winter! He just gets it. He’s so loyal and kind, I just adore him and feel like I know him.

What I loved: I already love historical fiction, but this book had such an eerie touch to it that was so symbolically beautiful! It was terrifyingly heartbreaking! I will be thinking about this book for a while.

What I disliked: The ending made me sad even though I understood, I guess I just wish it ended a little differently, but it wasn’t a bad ending. I just selfishly wanted it my way.

The entire time reading it I was thinking about re-reading it! This one will definitely make you think and feel it all!

Thank you,

Katherine Arden, Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley for this ARC copy

Posting this review 2/3/24 to my Instagram account and Goodreads account. Both linked to my NetGalley review and profile.

3.75/5 rounded up
——————

I’ve been a big Katherine Arden fan since reading her Winternight trilogy and seeing she had a new book out, I had to read it. While I’m not usually a big historical fiction fan, this is the book that could change my mind

The plot of this book is realistic in the elements of war, but it somehow plays on the emotions to take it a step farther. This book is a dual POV, told through Laura’s present and her brother’s past. This way of narrating the book really helped create this unique perspective on the story as a whole and the overlap of these siblings. The pacing falls a little bit slow for me personally, but it still moves along in an enjoyable pace. The realistic elements of the novel put you in the middle of the trenches, while the emotional have you feeling what these soldiers and nurses felt. It leaves room for interpretation for these emotions, too. It’s got blood and gore to it, but isn’t too graphic about these elements. The writing of this is beautiful and engrossing. Arden has this way about writing that makes me crave more.

The characters are enjoyable, but a little flat. Laura is incredibly ambitious and driven, set on unraveling the truth of her brother’s whereabouts. Freddie’s perspective really draws on the reader to put themselves in his shoes and feel his emotions. I greatly preferred learning about Freddie, seeing the events of war and what comes. Despite these pros, I just wanted a little more from them. The romances of this book have little buildup, though I still enjoyed them for their endings. The side characters play their roles well in the grand scheme of things. Being so character driven, I wish they all were a little more fleshed out and carefully considered.

What really sold me on this one was the incorporation of this magical realism through the use of Faland. I loved how his character advances the plot of the book, adding this slightly paranormal element to offset the seriousness of the content. It was my favorite device of the book, adding this touch of lightness and fantasy to a heavy topic book. The reality of what he does was interesting to watch play out. I enjoyed this subplot immensely.

I really enjoyed this book. If you love historical fiction and magical realism, it’s worth a pickup.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts was my most anticipated book of the year and I am pleased to say this is an absolute masterpiece. It's hauntingly beautiful and a masterfully crafted story that expertly combines the apocalyptic horrors of World War I with subtle supernatural/fantasy elements (will not say too much about that here because I find this story is best if the mysteries slowly unravel for the reader alongside the characters).

I enjoyed both Laura and Freddie's POVs equally and Arden does a great job of weaving them together. Their sibling relationship is the heart of the story but other equally compelling relationship dynamics emerge as well. It's not necessarily a book that I would call a "love story" but at the same time it is because the families, friendships, and romances explored within this book are the most important part.

While The Warm Hands of Ghosts is quite different than Arden's Winternight trilogy and her middle grade horror Small Spaces quartet, each of her works has a distinct lyrical, magical, and haunting quality that is certainly present here. Once again she has written a book that has immediately become an all time favorite and I will think about it, along with her other books, until the end of time.

Katherine Arden is slowly becoming one of my favorite authors. I fell in love with the Winternight trilogy, so I was very excited to get my hands on this one.

This felt like a Katherine Arden novel in all the best ways. The pacing, much like the Winternight trilogy, was slower, but not to its detriment. It gives you time to absorb the story and piece everything together, much like Laura and her friends are doing. There’s no constant rush through the plot, which I feel is so common in the fantasy genre. I think that the dual POV between Laura and Freddie really helps with this. It’s also one of the more interesting war stories I’ve read. Typically World War stories are told from an American POV, so it was refreshing to see something different.

This novel also has the unique characters I’ve come to expect in Arden’s stories. In particular, her lead characters always pull me in. They never feel like caricatures, and her lead females always fight the typical “strong female character” archetype. They are brilliant, unique, and strong characters without falling into strict lines.

The only reason this isn’t a five star for me is the romance subplot. We really just get little snippets of romance, but not enough to justify it’s place in the story. I’d have liked more of it, or nothing at all, as the story doesn’t necessarily need it’s supplement.

I wasn’t sure anything could live up to the force that is the Winternight trilogy, but Arden has secured her spot as an instant buy author for me with this one.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC!

"It was shocking. It was inevitable. It was home. It was the first time Freddie had felt alive in his own skin since the night he went up Passchendaele Ridge."

This book was incredible and wholly unforgettable. This harrowing tale was set during World War I and covers delicate topics of love, loss, and war. Katherine Arden wove fantasy elements into the history of the Great War effortlessly. The prose was dark and heartbreakingly beautiful. The writing is immersive and sweeps you right in, as if you're right there alongside the characters.

I could go on and on about the characters. Laura is one of those MCs that will go to great lengths for those she loves. Especially, her brother Freddie whom is a soldier and has went missing. Laura comes out of retirement as a field nurse and heads back into the war to figure out what has happened to her brother. What transpires after that is unimaginable and takes you into a world that is devastating, but still hopeful. Romance is more of a sub-plot, but I loved every achingly tender moment of it.

This book may not be for everyone, but it is for me. If you enjoy historical fiction with a war setting, romance with an enemies to lovers aspect, realistic characters, and lyrical prose then I would rush to grab this one on release day.

Thank you Netgalley and Del Rey for an eARC.

I’ve been waiting for this author to come out with another book ever since I finished her first trilogy. `The Bear and the Nightingale was one book of a few that got me back into reading and enjoy fantasy worlds once again. How could I not be anticipating another book from her? Sadly, her latest didn’t work for me.

The book is told from two point-of-views, Laura and Her maybe dead, but could be alive brother Freddie. Out of both of these point-of-views I thought that Freddie had more personality. Although Laura was strong-willed and would do anything to save/bring her brother back from whatever she just felt stiff like a board. Don’t get me wrong, she does have her own issues like Freddie because both have seen war and death. Those two things can do a real number on a person and this book does explore that. There is supposed to be a lot of emotional endeavors to this book but the only real emotion I had was boredom. Which is sad to say. I just didn’t connect with these characters on any level. It could be said that the book is more plot-driven than anything and because of that the world-building and character development really suffered.

Probably due to a culmination of everything previously mentioned the pacing for this book is very slow. It would pick up at certain areas and then immediately slow down once again. It really made it hard to get through and it’s not a very big book to begin with.

Overall, this was okay but not for me. I can see it doing well in the right hands though and so if this book still catches your attention then go ahead and give it a try!

I really struggled with this one, and to be honest I found myself skimming alot. I had previously loved Arden's Winternight trilogy, as well as her spooky reads for younger readers but couldn't get into Warm Hands. I found it hard to relate to the characters and their thought processes were very choppy. However, I think if you are more into thought provoking characters, historical fiction with fantastical elements this might be for you!

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is well-named. It is a novel about the ghosts, literal and figurative, that remain after your expectations for your life undergo a major upheaval.

Laura and Freddie Iven, our two POV narrators, are no strangers to the world ending. Growing up in a fanatic family, they expected the world to end in a blaze of glory multiple times. When instead, their lives end / change little by little and also all at once during their experience serving as a nurse (Laura) and a soldier (Freddie) on the frontlines of WWI, they find themselves both more and less prepared to face the end of society as they know it.

At the opening of the novel, Laura has returned home a war hero, but finds herself quickly drawn back to the frontlines when Freddie's affects are returned home with a cryptic message that makes her believe he may still be alive. The novel then alternates POVs - we discover why Freddie has gone missing and we join Laura on her search for him. There is also a mysterious figure named Faland who offers both siblings a sinister hope - the opportunity to forget - for a night, for a while, or forever. Does that path offer salvation from PTSD and war, and the decadence of luxury, wine, and art? Or will it consume everything that makes life worthwhile?

This book was extremely compelling. I really liked Laura in particular as a character - I found her believable, competence, and caring. I was invested in her success. I also loved the philosophical puzzle Faland offers to us as readers, forcing us to contend deeply with the choice he offers and wonder which we would ultimately take. There was also a very satisfying twist towards the end.

This would have been a five-star read for me if:
- The dialogue was a bit stronger
- Some of the side characters were more developed (especially Winter and Mary)
- The end had a little bit more time to breathe

Still, this is a book I will continue to think about for a while. Katherine Arden has managed to find a unique perspective and narrative in a fairly saturated world of books about war, and I really appreciate and applaud that. And I will continue to wonder if and to what extent I would choose to take (false?) refuge in Faland's gilded comfort if I were in Freddie and Laura's shoes.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC!

If you have read Divine Rivals this is like the big sister with more adult and dark undertones to it. I absolutely loved it. It is a haunting beautiful story of a sister trying to find her brother during WWI with dark paranormal happenings. This is my first book I read by this author and now I will be pushing her trilogy to the top of my tbr! Thank you to Katherine Arde, Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Del Rey for the eARC.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a lot of the things I love - historical fiction, a little bit of magical realism, and multiple POVs. Without giving too much away, the premise follows a WWI nurse trying to find her missing brother who disappeared in action on the frontlines. You follow her search and then an alternate timeline following her brother and how he disappeared until both POVs align.

In my opinion, the writing was not my favorite. I have not read any other books by this author, but from what I've seen in other reviews, this isn't her best writing. Throughout, there were moments that didn't flow as well and I had to reread sections to figure out what was happening. It felt like things would happen suddenly in a sentence or two and there was no lead up and I would have to reread to make sure I was understanding everything.

The overall plot was also a little slow in the first half and I felt like the last third of the book was its best. Although, I will say things wrapped up a little too nicely at the end and I felt like the relationships formed at the end weren't as explored as I would've liked.

Overall, it was a nice read and interesting take but I feel like I've seen it better accomplished in other books I've read in the last few years. I think most people will like this one . It seems like the author really put a lot of research into this one and that it was a labor of love.

Thank you to Random House Publishing, NetGalley, and Katherine Arden for granting me an arc of this book. It was one of my anticipated 2024 releases and I’m so glad I got to read it!

Posted 2/2/24 on Goodreads.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC to review!
Rating (on a scale of 1 to 5, 5 being excellent)
Quality of writing: 4
Pace: 3
Plot development: 3
Characters: 3
Enjoyability: 3
Ease of Reading: 4

Overall rating: 3 out of 5

Thanks to Netgalley and Ballentine for providing a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a mix of historical fiction, mystery, and supernatural elements. I loved this book.
The story starts in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in January 1918. A ship laden with explosives has blown up in the harbor, destroying much of Halifax, and killing Laura Iven’s parents. Laura is a registered nurse, sent home from the military hospitals of World War I after suffering a severe leg injury.

While nursing the injured from the explosion, injuries reminiscent of the wounded she left behind in Belgium, a crate arrives from Flanders with her brother Freddie’s belongings. But she’s not received a death notice from the army. Since her brother is the only member of her family left, Laura returns as a civilian nurse to the war and its hospitals to search for her brother.

Laura’s search will take her beyond the physical lines of the war. In a place with so much death, the demarcation between the physical world and the supernatural blurs. Faland inhabits this no-man’s-land. He comes and goes as he pleases, preying on the PTSD of soldiers at war. Once a man is in Faland’s grip, he never wants to leave. If Laura finds physically finds Freddie, will she still lose him to his memories?

The research Arden put into this novel is evident because I was immersed in post-explosion Halifax, the military hospitals, and the horrors of trench warfare. I was drawn to Laura-her commitment to her patients, her bravery at returning to the front, her determination to find Freddie and bring him home. Freddie is very much a soldier caught up in a war he doesn’t understand. Surrounded by death and destruction, he finds the only way to survive is trust a German soldier, the very person he was sent overseas to kill. Freddie’s battle is as much a mental war as a physical one, at a time when soldiers suffering from the mental strains of war were left on their own.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a well-written historical novel that also combines elements of mystery (is Freddie dead or alive?) and the supernatural (who or what is Faland?) Arden’s newest novel has earned a place on my bookshelf.

5/5 stars.