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The Snow Queen  By  cover art

The Snow Queen

By: Mercedes Lackey
Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
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Publisher's summary

Aleksia, Queen of the Northern Lights, is mysterious, beautiful, and widely known to have a heart of ice. No one would seek her wisdom except as a last resort. But when she's falsely accused of unleashing evil on nearby villages, she realizes there's an impostor out there far more heartless than she could ever be.

And when a young warrior following the Tradition disappears, leaving his sweetheart and mother to fear the worst, Aleksia's powers are needed as never before.

Now, on a journey through a realm of perpetual winter, it will take all her skills, a mother's faith and a little magic to face down an enemy more formidable than any she has ever known....

©2008 Mercedes Lackey (P)2008 Audible, Inc.

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What listeners say about The Snow Queen

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  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Love the book, narrator problematic...

I love Mercedes Lackey and this series too. I was really excited when books 1 and 2 in the series were released as well as this, book 4. Its been around for a while but I didn't buy it till it looked like the rest in the series would also be coming out.

The story is fun, easy to follow, if fairly predictable, but I don't really mind that as it is based around well known fairy tales after all!

The only problem I had is that the narrator, Gabra Zackman, didn't know the word 'mage'. Instead she consistently says 'madge' throughout the book, which, as the word comes up fairly often, I found exceedingly annoying. There were a couple of other problems, like a girl wandering through a forest full of bandits with golden 'plates' (rather than plaits) wound round her head, but these are one offs, so not too problematic. The continual mispronunciation of mage, however, had me yelling MAGE at my computer every few minutes as I listened, and wondering whether the narrator had been paid a 'wadge' rather than a wage!

Other than this problem, the narration was really good and enjoyable, and in the recordings of books 1 and 2, the same narrator does a great job, AND has learned the word mage! So I am really hoping that when they get to this point in the series, they will re-record the book so I can enjoy it fully, along with the rest of the series.

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15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Good Listen

I had read two or three other books in the 500 Kingdoms series. They aren't great works of literature but they are inventive and fun. I enjoy the author's work so I picked this one up.
It was good, the story pans back and forth between two areas of focus for much of the book, which was a little difficult at first because there's often no marker to indicate the switch. I was irked at the pronunciation of the word "mage," but other than that the narrator did an excellent job, even the accents were good.
The story was interesting and engaging, and I didn't see the ending coming. I would recommend the book to any fantasy lover as an interesting view on fairytales.

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8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great, except for the mispronunciation ...

I love Mercedes Lackey stories and have all her books. This story is very enjoyable, but the narrator mispronounces 'mage' as maj or maj-is (mages). That simply made me crazy and I can't figure out why the producers didn't stop it. Such a simple thing, but when it would irk the heck out of me every single time I heard another 'maj', I realized that much more and I would have stopped listening to the story. Now I'm worried about listening to another book read by this narrator, even though she has a beautiful voice. Although, her voices for the different characters seemed to change a bit as well. Regardless, I would still recommend this story for a light and enjoyable listen.

This book served me well while on a two month road trip, as it kept me busy while on a few very long days of driving.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Pleasantly surprised (and annoyed)

I've been a Mercedes Lackey fan, but hadn't read or listened to any of this series and was pleasantly surprised because I thought fairy tales??? It turns out that setting a novel in a fairy tale universe makes for an enjoyable fantasy novel. I got wrapped up in the story line which was fun even though it was fairy tale predictable. I've always been able to care about M.L.'s characters and these were no exception. I even eventually overlooked the narrator's frequent mispronunciation of the word "mage" which is a shame because she did a good job otherwise.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Pronunciation is a problem

How could the performance have been better?

I really wish the narrator had taken the time to figure out how to pronounce certain of the words in this book. Other reviews have mentioned the mispronunciation of the word "mage", so I won't belabour that, but the narrator also repeatedly mispronounces "Sami" (She says Sam-eye instead of Sam-ee.) As with the word mage, you might think, "Well, but how often could that possibly come up? I'm sure it won't be a problem." It comes up a lot though. Probably almost as much as "mage." I've listened to, and enjoyed, other performances by Gabra Zackman, but this one made me want to shoot myself. I spent a lot of my listening time muttering correct pronunciations under my breath.

Any additional comments?

I enjoy the Five Hundred Kingdoms series, but this installment is merely "Okay." Were I to rank them in order of preference, this book would take the bottom spot.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

lazy narrator

Okay, I like the idea of this series, so I am continuing, and I have had so many people recommend Mercedes Lackey to me that I am giving this a go. The writing is better in this book than book #1, though she does have her darling words, which bug me. The story here is not a problem.

However, the narrator here is lazy. It's like she doesn't pay attention to what she's saying and gets the emphasis and cadence dead wrong too often. Preatchett's narrators actually read the book prior to recording and asked him for clarification when they couldn't make it out. I wish the reader had done so here. She just gets into a sort of sing-songy reading-aloud-in-class rhythm and plunges onward.

Also, this book in particular has clear references to the Kalevala, yet she can't be bothered to learn how to pronounce Sámi. I mean, there's a flippin' accent on the first syllable, so why would you think it was "same-EYE"? And the names... Gah. I mean, if you are Eastern European, book #3 is going to be like listening to Americans mispronounce your name all day long. She completely mangled Belarus in book #3.

Now, if some may argue that this is fantasy and the pronunciations are up to interpretation, but not when you are borrowing from an existing culture. Respect the culture enough to learn how to say the names.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Great story, but

Mercedes Lackey never fails in delivering a great book. My only complaint, is not with the book itself but with Audible advertising the book as a "sizzling" level romance in the romance package. That title would be better suited to Fortune's Fool. The amount of romance in this book barely qualifies as sweet.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great Rendition, But Work on Pronunciation.

I love Mercedes Lackey. Great story, but this is the third of her audible renditions where the 'A' in 'Mage' is pronounced the same as 'Badge'. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE get this right! It's pronounced with a hard A, as in 'PAGE'!

Any fan of her or any fantasy books knows the proper way to say it and I'm sure they are wincing along with me every time that word is uttered. PLEASE FIX THIS IN ALL HER BOOKS!!! This includes the 'Hunter' Trilogy.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A strong step on the journey through this world

The Five Hundred Kingdoms as a whole is beautifully realized by Mercedes Lackey. I decided to raise my rating of this from a prior reading, because the author does an excellent job with godmothers influencing the Tradition--clever and fascinating. I actually loved the opening the most, the explanation of runes, and how to deal with unusual magic. I have no objection to the pronunciations, as I assume the author wanted them that way, and in another world, the pronunciation could be different. I admit I didn't follow the conclusion too carefully. I was there for the journey.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Can't pronounce mage.

The book was pretty good but the narrator kept saying mage as madjj? I'm sorry but I don't even know how to spell it! since it's a fairly magical world it really took me out of it.

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