Who doesn't love a good ghost story?Thought provoking and heart wrenching. This slow and lovely story is one I won't forget. If you love historical fantasy, give this a try. Although, I don't think this book is for everyone, I think it will find it's audience

Thank you to the publisher for granting my wish!

I wish this book focused more on Freddie's POV as his story was much more compelling. While I felt for Laura and her longing to find Freddie I was just reading through her chapters to get to Freddie's rather an truly enjoying her story. Heartbreaking, edge of your seat, stay up all night reading because you have to know how it ends.

Dual POV, WW1 Setting, Death, Grief, Mental Health, Loss

*5 stars*

This was a bleak, heartbreaking story of war and love.

Arden’s idea of what a devil of the old world would do if he found himself in the new hell brought forth by the Great War blended the historical with the fantastical perfectly. The science fiction feel of the new reality and the realistic trauma of the magical hotel gave this book an eerie atmosphere. This was my first book by Arden, and I will definitely be going through her backlog after this.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC of this work. All opinions in this review are my own.

It’s January 1918, and Laura Iven is back in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the city of her birth, after having been recently decommissioned from the Belgian war front where she served as a nurse with the Canadian Medical Corps. She has earned a medal for heroism and has an injury that almost cost her the use of her right leg, consequence of the Germans shelling the makeshift hospital where she worked, which was located next to an ammunition depot. In Halifax things are not any better than the war front . A ship carrying explosive cargo exploded in the harbor, costing thousands of lives and untold property damage.

Laura has been tending the injured of the harbor disaster, where she lost both parents, when she receives a parcel containing items from her soldier brother, Freddie, who is presumed missing in the Belgian front. Using old and new connections, Laura embarks on a trip to England in early spring of 1918, then to France-Belgium’s Forbidden Zone, to retrace Freddie’s last whereabouts and find out, if possible, what happened to her brother in the end. For that purpose, she is willing to re-enroll as nurse and confront the horrors of life in the front once more.

Most soldiers would rather trade their cherished memories, or the ones they’d rather bury deep within, for the comfort of a glass of wine, by a warm fire, listening to delightful music… And who would blame them? But in so doing they may be buying oblivion from an elusive master with an obscure agenda—one that would imperil their very souls. In November of 1917, Freddie Iven is in that unenviable position. He has attached to a mysterious fiddler, who wanders the war front causing havoc in his wake, after having survived being buried alive when his bunker collapsed, and having been rescued by a German soldier to whom he procured medical aid. Deserting the army and aiding an enemy are grounds for death by hanging, things that Freddie would rather not dwell upon, hence the fiddler. Can he make his way back to his sister with his sanity intact? Will there be any part of him left for saving?

Gloriously immersive and atmospheric, more than pure historical fiction or war story, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a genre-bending character study on the effects of war and trauma on soldiers and civilians in the frontlines, that unfolds at its own pace, not rushing but not deliberately slow either, with great world building and paranormal elements that suit the mood of the narrative and give it an otherworldly feel.

There are two storylines, one in November 1917 and on (Freddie’s), and one in January 1918 until late Spring (Laura’s). Eventually both storylines converge, but the result is slightly disorienting because it doesn’t happen in real time. Chapters alternate between settings where Freddie and Laura happen to be at a certain time, mostly along the Forbidden Zone. The main characters—Laura, Freddie, Hans, and the fiddler—are very well realized, the others less so, but not to the extent in which they feel superfluous or wooden. It is, after all, on these four characters that the story relies heavily upon, so there’s little loss by not making the remaining characters as sympathetic or “real” as the main ones feel.

Overall, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is an immersive, atmospheric exploration of war and trauma via a character study of two soldiers on opposing sides of War World I. Paranormal elements give it an extra layer of complexity and mystery than that of a straightforward historical fiction novel. Well done!

Thanks to the publisher for granting me access to a free digital copy via Netgalley.

This book was unexpectedly wonderful. The backdrop of Europe and Canada during WW I was a new place and time for me in my reading life, and I felt like Arden painted it well. It feels like an apocalypse, for sure, and I felt less than surprised when this book took on some magical-realism/dark fairy tale vibes. I loved the sections written from Freddy’s POV most for most of the book, but the last 30% or so altogether was wonderful. Fantastic read, and thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!

This wasn't my cup of tea. The synopsis really caught my attention, but I honestly found myself very bored while reading, There were parts that brought me back into the world and the characters, but ultimately this isn't something I would pick up again. I may not be the target audience. I have read The Bear and the Nightingale before, so I had high hopes since I enjoyed that book. I'm sad that I didn't like this one, and I would have DNF'd it if it wasn't for a Netgalley review.

For having everything that I would normally enjoy in historical fiction, this did not deliver.
The themes throughout and the split POVs between brother and sister were promising. However, the character development was so non-existent that the story almost felt inauthentic. Laura's drive to find her brother was overshadowed by her self-wallowing, which made her unlikeable and lacking in personality. Her chapters were such a chore to read that they took away from Freddie's, which were otherwise far more intriguing. I think the author was aiming to compel with the hint of magical realism, but it seemed like overcompensation for the two-dimensional nature of the characters. This is meant to be a heartfelt story of love and survival, but was frankly underwhelming and banal. I understand what the author was trying to convey, but the execution was poor.

Another masterpiece from Katherine Arden. I loved how intriguing the story was. It was dark, it was mysterious, and it was love. I can’t wait for all my special editions to arrive! Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for the opportunity to read in exchange for a review.

Maybe this was a case of mismatched expectations, but I was expecting more fantasy/magical realism than what was given. Sadly, this was a lot more historical fiction than I thought it'd be.

So with that said, this book wasn't really for me. Which is odd for me to admit because I love war stories, both fiction and nonfiction. While I was interested in Freddie and Winter's story, Laura's narrative put me to sleep. She was one of those characters who just really wasn't interesting at all, despite her cool background as a wounded field nurse.

I did like the writing though and I liked how the author dove into the horrors of war, using both Laura and her brother's experiences to point out similarities and contrasts between civilians and soldiers in war. I just wish it held my attention more.

Thank you to Del Rey and NetGalley for this arc.

DNF @ 50%. I tried and tried and tried and TRIED to get engaged with this book but it just fell so flat for me. I couldn’t connect with Laura at all. The way the story was told was very slow and unexciting. There was so much that I thought could’ve been done with the story as is, but it just wasn’t executed in a way that made me feel the way I hoped to feel while reading this. Not my cup of tea, hopefully someone else’s. Thanks for the ARC!

This is the story of Laura and Freddie Iven, sister and brother. Set during WWI, both Ivens serve in the Canadian army. Laura serves as a nurse, Freddie as a soldier. Both have different, but horrifying, experiences of the war. Laura was wounded and sent home unbeknownst to Freddie. While home recovering, she receives a package indicating that he is dead. But, it's light on the details. And no matter who she talks to, she can't find out where or how he died. When the opportunity arises, Laura seizes it to go back to the war zone and search out information herself.
Freddie had been trapped in an overturned pillbox with a wounded German soldier named Winter. They make a truce and against odds, dig their way out. They then need to cross the hellscape of war to get to safety. By that time, the tentative bond they forged in the pillbox has gotten much stronger. Neither is willing to give the other up as prisoner nor participate in futher killing.

Both Laura and Freddie have heard rumors amidst the war of a fiddler or hotelier who can give you ease. Those who claim to have seen him have often gone mad - some for the peace he provided. But every peace has its price. Are they willing to pay it?

This book is very well written. The prose is nice, the research impeccable. The descriptions conjure pictures of slices of the war. Their stories are told in alternating viewpoints between Laura and Freddie.

I loved the characters, especially Laura. I felt she had the strongest characterization in the book. Freddie would be second. Laura has as a companion a well off woman who lost her son in the war. The woman goes by the nickname Pim. Freddie has Winter as a companion for much of the novel, but significantly not for some parts. Laura is strong when Pim seems weak. And Winter is strong when Freddie seems weak.

Pace and plotwise, basically it hits the ground running and doesn't let up much. There's both war action and hospital action with a smattering of other. All of it advances the plot.

I gave it 5 out of 5 stars. Overall, it's well written. Prose flows nicely. Action moves the plot forward at a good pace. Characterization is good, especially Laura. I would recommend this book to people who like a vivid, yet creepy, sort of war story. There are ghosts and hints at other.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden was published February 13th, 2024 by Del Rey.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. This did not affect my opinion.

Laura receives a letter that her brother Freddie has died on the battlefield, but something seems off so she decides to travel back to the front as a hospital volunteer and see if she can find out the truth. When she returns to Europe, she and her traveling companions spend an odd night at a hotel where their memories seem altered. They find there way to the hospital where Laura's friend is able to explain about her brother and his connection to a German spy, but Laura also keeps hearing about the strange hotelier. As she gets closer to locating Freddie, she realizes he may be connected to the strange man. Overall, a story told in two timelines with Laura searching for her brother and then a few months prior with her brother surviving an attack with a German soldier and their subsequent entanglement with the strange man. At times it was unclear what was real and there were somewhat gruesome descriptions of the battlefield, but overall an interesting story.

A ghost story that takes place during World War I is a dark story about trauma, madness and the wastefulness of war. Just a beautiful story.

*Thank you so much to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the chance to review an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. *

I really wanted to love this but I was mostly just bored the entire time. The cover is beautiful and it's unfortunate that I don't love this book enough to buy it because I love the cover so much. I think I'm just tired of World War books, both 1 and 2. I do think this author has a beautiful writing style that keeps me interested because though I feel generally ok about this book, I never once wanted to stop reading. The touch of paranormal was nice, but overall this book just wasn't for me.

Oh, lord, this book. I knew this book was going to break me. I knew it, but I still wasn't prepared.

I really don't have the words to do this justice. Ghosts is set against the brutal landscape of the Great War, and it doesn't pull any punches. There are ghosts, and devils, and love in all its forms. It is a powerful, gut-wrenching, masterpiece of a novel.

I may never fully recover from this one.

Quick and Dirty
-dual POV WWI historical fiction
-brother/sister bond
-paranormal/magical realism aspects
-introspective and very thought-provoking


What Worked
Wow. What a masterful novel! Bleak, desperate, haunting, reflective, and maddening are all words I would use to describe one of my new favorite books. I’d also say it’s hopeful, emotional, heartfelt, and deeply complex. I was so swept away by Arden’s writing style that it was hard to stop thinking about this book in between reading sessions. And I’ve not stopped thinking about it since. How far would you go to save someone you love? What is love, really? Grief, shame, self-doubt, and depression all surface in the novel, giving added emotional depth that elevates the book beyond a typical wartime novel. Arden explores what it means to be human in an inhumane world full of death, dying, loss, and darkness. Yet her characters and their relationships light a path forward for readers seeking a ray of hope. I loved this book so much that I ordered my first-ever special edition! It’s on the way from London now, and I can’t wait to add it to the forever favorites collection.

What Didn’t Work
Nothing. Not a single thing. I loved everything about this beautiful book.

Read This If
Folks who appreciate good vs evil, dark vs light struggles in a dark, atmospheric setting will love this one!

Katherine Arden is best known for her Winternight trilogy, a lush fantasy series that incorporates elements of medieval Russian history and folklore, complex political intrigue, and a fairytale-esque central romance between Vasya, a feral, fierce girl who can see spirits, and the frost king Morozko. (Consider this your gentle nudge to start reading The Bear and the Nightingale immediately, is what I’m saying.)To say that a lot of readers— read: me—were eagerly awaiting the announcement of what she might do next is something of an understatement. But I doubt any of us expected The Warm Hands of Ghosts, a haunting, lyrical exploration of grief and trauma with a dash of the fantastical on top.

A book that feels more overtly like traditional historical fiction than Arden’s earlier works, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is not always a particularly easy read. It’s a story that wrestles with loss, connection, family, and the heartbreak of one world painfully giving way to another. It’s also a vivid war novel, delving into the apocalyptic feel of World War I in a way that often feels like a sci-fi story. As flying machines drop bombs from the sky and chemical gases waft through the air and silently choke men to death, soldiers still fight with bayonets, send messages with the help of pigeons, and rely on horses and mules to move munitions. So much of this setting carries a feeling of intense unreality, a sense that’s made all the more poignant by the fact that our current pop culture landscape tends to eschew World War I narratives in favor of those about Europe’s second great war. The end result is a painfully liminal story that feels simultaneously magical and all too real, a tale in which it seems possible to see the ideas of the old world slowly transforming into those of the new right in front of us.

This is an exceptionally well-written and well-researched historical fiction book, set against the backdrop of World War 1. This time period was wild - the confluence of modern warfare on a massive scale, life-changing technology, shifting societal attitudes, and a devastating global pandemic which killed more people than all of the 20th century wars combined. If ever there was a time for the metaphorical devil to walk the world, this was one. And in this book, he does, in the form of a mysterious violinist who can show battle-scarred and traumatized men and women their heart's desires - lost loves, peace, absolution, and blissful release from pain and grief - but at a hefty price. This book is rife with religious allegory and allusion (and for the record, I'm not even the slightest bit religious), but it doesn't presuppose belief - it functions here as an extemporaneous literary lens through which to process the cataclysm of change wrought by the humanity - and inhumanity - of humans. "May you live in interesting times", indeed. This is a period in history which doesn't get as much attention as it deserves, considering the radical ways the world was altered in its wake.

The story is told from the alternating perspectives of a pair of Canadian siblings, both deep in the mire of the conflict. Laura is a combat nurse, and I love that. Historically (and tragically) overlooked, the role of women in WWI is richly explored here, and their courage, heroism, effort, sacrifice, and contribution are recognized. Laura was honorably discharged after her field hospital was shelled, and sent back home to Halifax to recover from her injuries - just in time for the great explosion in which thousands were killed or injured by a burning munitions ship in the harbour. The only family she has left is her younger brother Freddie, who has gone missing in battle. We also see events from his perspective, and the sheer misery and terror of trench warfare. Convinced there is more to her brother's story, Laura goes back into the jaws of beast, as it were, to find out what happened to him. The author's thorough research shines in a wealth of immersive and authentic period detail on every page, which was fascinating to experience. The book explores larger questions about war, about systems vs individuals, about the meaning of loyalty or treachery, about grief and trauma, about the bonds of love and shared experience, and about the function of memory, good and bad, in identity and self - what it means to keep them, whether we can truly escape them, and what we gain and lose from owning them.

I love that the main characters in the story were Canadian, rather than ubiquitously American or British. I love that they were simultaneously unconventional and still believably products of their time - the characterization reflects the crossroads of a society at the precipice of monumental change. I love the way that the story unfolded, layer by layer, so that even the supernatural elements did not feel out of place, but rather a shadow of circumstances already too terrible to seem truly real. And I love the way that the characters' rawest emotions, and the essence of their souls, were captured in monstrously beautiful (and gorgeously described) violin music. Nero may have played the fiddle while Rome burned, but when the world burns, the story needs a bigger villain to take up the bow. And I love the thoughtful, nuanced,, subtle, and honest love stories at its beating heart - between family, between friends, between soldiers, between coworkers, born of shared history, shared blood, shared trauma, and shared survival. None of these overwhelmed the story, and yet they WERE the story.

However, because I can't avoid a perverse tendency towards pedantic dissection, I must acknowledge a few minute issues. While bodies certainly washed up along Canada's eastern coast, it would have been difficult to go out to the wreck of the Titanic in fishing boats since it lies 12,500 feet down at the bottom of the sea and wasn't discovered until 1985, but I know the author knows this. People in the story could instantly recognize Canadian uniforms, British uniforms, and American uniforms, but a German character was able to walk through an entire garrison of Allied soldiers without anyone recognizing his German uniform (yes, he was covered in mud, but everyone was covered in mud). And the book references the beginning of the influenza pandemic, which disproportionately chewed up young, otherwise healthy adults, yet we only see two characters affected, instead of the actual tidal wave of sick people that came to overwhelm hospitals, decimated communities, and hastened the end of the war. I realize that this book is telling a different story, but the hospitals in the book would have seen many patients and staff sick and dying of influenza during the time period it covers. It's not plausible that Laura would be the only one in her group or her area to get sick. The book mentions that "everyone seemed to have a cold" but nobody ever seemed to get seriously ill - and they really did. My great-grandmother was a new mother who nursed other women's babies when they got too sick to feed them, and my great-grandfather was a carpenter to had to pivot from building houses to building coffins to meet the surging demand. I'm not an expert on epidemiology or the exact timeline of the 1918 influenza outbreak by any means, but from what I understand, I don't think the book fully captured the magnitude and devastation of this pandemic, or its role in the war.

None of these issues significantly impact my excellent opinion of the book, but they were enough to keep it from being a perfect read, so I'm giving it 4.5 stars.

Overall, an absorbing, thoughtful, beautifully written, and ultimately hopeful story. I highly recommend it, and I look forward to reading more from this talented author. I already own her Winternight Trilogy and am eagerly looking forward to reading it.

I'm thankful to the author, the publisher, and to Netgalley for providing me with a free advance reader copy of the book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

Laura is a Canadian nurse, home from healing soldiers in the Great War, but still dogged by tragedy. Honorably discharged due to injury, Laura has the chance to live out the rest of the war at home with honor, and that’s what she’s meant to want, but nothing feels right. When she receives a package with her younger brother’s dog tags and an inconclusive note about his fate, she joins up with a celebrated nurse and a rich war widow to staff a hospital near where Freddie was last seen, determined to discover his fate and put her ghosts to rest. But the fatalities of war are unquiet dead and Laura’s ghosts refuse to let her be.
Months previously, her brother is caught in the twilight space of no-man’s-land with an enemy soldier and the haunting sound of a violin. Even if Laura is able to find him, alive, will Freddie want to be found?
Second super positive review I’m writing today! I want to be mad at this book alongside the Spirit Bares Its Teeth for preceding my current reading slump, but I can’t be.
This is a book for right now. It’s also for the 1910s, the 1960s, the 2000s, over and over again- but it felt like it was for right now. Katherine Arden has taken the absolute horror of existing as one person in a world where those above you commit senseless atrocities that make even the devil blanche and made it into a lyrical, haunting story. It didn’t give me hope, perse, and I appreciated that in a strange way. Blind hope moves us towards inaction same as all-encompassing hopelessness. The Warm Hands of Ghosts sees that horror, the feeling of powerlessness and disgust at it, and names it.
It’s also a book about trauma and mental health. When someone is going through something so intense internally, it can make them feel broken. Often the thing said by well-intentioned friends and family is “you are not broken,” which can be so hard to hear when it feels so false in the moment. This book says, so what? Let’s say that terrible voice in your head is right and you are ‘broken’, you are missing some part of who you once were and are less for it- fine, even if that worse-case-scenario is somehow true, that doesn’t make you any less deserving of life, any less deserving of love and a future.
This book hurt to read, but it was a good hurt. I felt it in my chest and I plan to read it again.