Winter Rose
core novel 1996 Winter Rose
Record
| First published | 1996 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.86 (7,704 ratings, collected 2026-09-14) |
| Page count | 262 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780441003341 |
| Internal chronology | 1 |
Synopsis
In a tale inspired by the old ballad of Tam Lin, sisters Rois and Laurel Melior, daughters of a countryman devoted to his orchards and hives, become drawn in different ways to Corbet Lynn, an aristocratic young man who returns after years away to restore his family's long-abandoned, faintly sinister estate next door. While the more conventional Laurel moves toward an ordinary courtship, Rois's restless, growing fascination with Corbet leads her past the boundaries of village propriety and toward long-buried secrets surrounding both the Lynn family's troubled history and the wild, half-glimpsed presence of the faerie world pressing in at the edges of the wood. As autumn deepens into winter, Rois finds herself pulled further from safety and closer to a truth the rest of her family would rather leave undisturbed.
Where it sits
- Universe: Winter Rose
- Series: Winter Rose core; position 1 of 2 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Patricia A. McKillip
Awards (verified)
- Mythopoeic Fantasy Award (Adult Literature (combined Adult/Children's)), 1997: finalist
- Locus Award (Best Fantasy Novel), 1997: finalist; 3rd place in the Locus poll; registered as finalist per this project's no-cutoff Locus-poll convention.
- Nebula Award (Best Novel), 1996: nominated
Notes
- From the series record (Winter Rose): Solstice Wood (2006) is a direct sequel to Winter Rose (1996), returning to the same family/land and its fey-realm curse a generation later; publication order matches internal chronology, no dispute.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings, but they resolve to the exact same sequence for this book, so one combined line is shown instead of two identical ones.
- Reading order, within the series Winter Rose: position 1 of 2: next Solstice Wood (2006)
Sources
- Wikipedia: Winter Rose (novel)
- Wikipedia: Solstice Wood
- The Nebula Awards: Winter Rose nominated-work page
- The Mythopoeic Society, official Fantasy Award finalists list
- sfadb: Patricia A. McKillip
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