Fisher, Catherine. Snow-Walker.

FISHER, Catherine. Snow-walker. HarperCollins, Greenwillow. 625p. c2004. 0-06-072476-5. $7.99. JS

To quote the review of the hardcover in KLIATT, September 2004: Fisher's newest novel weaves a story from both Celtic and Norse mythology in a feudal world terrorized by Gundrun, a Snow-Walker from the edge of the world. Gundrun comes back to the Jarlshold with Ragnar, the lone survivor of a war band sent to defeat the Snow-Walkers terrorizing the northlands. When through treachery Ragnar becomes the new Jarl, she reigns with an icy hand, using her sorcery to control the people of the Jarlshold through fear, even sending her only son Karl into exile in the north. Jessa and her cousin Thorkil are the youngest in the line of Wulfings, the family that has always produced the Lord Jarl. Because they are a threat to Ragnar's leadership, she sends them in exile to Thrasirshall where the mysterious Karl is imprisoned. Banding together, they return to Jarlshold where Karl challenges his mother's rule. She disappears, leaving the hold with a curse that soon takes shape as a cold, slow death of the world they know.

Wulfgar tares over as Jarl, but his reign is haunted by a mysterious creature loosed from the north by Gundrun, a creature with a deadly hunger. When Wulfgar's wife Signi falls victim to Gundrun's soul-thievery, Jessa, Rari, and their band of followers have no choice but to travel into the deep white, where Karl must face off with his mother in a final battle to save the people of the Jarlshold as well as his own soul. Michele Winship, Asst. Prof., Capital Univ., Columbus, OH

J--Recommended for junior high school students. The contents are particular interest to young adolescents and their teachers.

S--Recommended for senior high school students.