Today I am looking at another Frozen book that delves into the world of Nordic mythology for another light horror novel starring Elsa and Anna. This book is so interesting as a Frozen fan as it is a celebration of all things Frozen, the authors reference many past works of Frozen literary work from past books that they had worked on to Frozen books written by others and a key character in this book was first introduced in an arc from the Dark Horse Frozen comics.
It was so nice to see past adventures Elsa and Anna had on the page referenced in this book and thankfully that doesn’t detract from the story being told. They are just nice nuggets for people that read those books to smile at and perhaps new readers might want to check out the other Frozen books. And I’d recommend it as there is not a bad Frozen book released yet.
Authors
Jen Calonita and Mari Mancusi
I could not think of two better people to take on a book that is meant to be a celebration for Frozen fans than two authors who are big Frozen fans themselves and wrote in my opinion the two best Frozen books ever released.
There’s a great interview with the two authors how they talked about this book being written during the pandemic and how they would Facetime each other to make sure the book flowed. They also make an excellent point about how if you are to write for an IP, it helps if you are a fan of the franchise you are working on.
To be honest, I think it’s vitally important for authors of these kinds of series to be fans themselves. It brings an authenticity to the work.
This quote from Mari Mancusi is so important to me as when a piece of expanded media is worked on by someone who loves the piece of media it is a part of, it creates a stronger connection for the audience of fans as well. I also appreciate how Mancusi says this is something different from what she has worked on with the spooky angle and she does a good job in that angle. And while this story does lean towards the spooky, there is also a sense of tragedy as it deals with a spirit trying to resolve unfinished business from fifty years ago. This is where we get the Nordic creature for this book, a dragur.
The draugr (also known as draugen, draugur or dreygur) is an undead being known from sagas, folktales, and segja (Old Norse).
In the book, Olaf compares the dragur to a zombie, and for an American audience that has probably never heard of this creature before, that is a decent comparison as the audience is able to piece together that this is an undead creature haunting Arendelle.
It’s like a zombie that can control the weather
While a dragur is not a zombie, this sells the idea that Elsa and Anna are facing an undead creature and the weather line is key as well as Sissel does bring about a rather nasty storm that threatens the titular Polar Nights celebration that Anna is hosting for the first as queen.
Cover
This cover is gorgeous as it tells you what is happening. It’s important to note this is the first book set after Frozen II seen here by the outfits the sisters are wearing. Beyond that though, you have Anna and Elsa looking in on Arndelle as a storm hangs over it, and up in the clouds is the silhouette of the dragur. It shows the dragur as a perceived threat to the people of Arendelle and the sisters wonder how will they stop it.
The Plot
Our tale begins with a ghost story told by Kristoff while the Frozen cast is out on a camping trip of two sisters named Sissel and Inger from the kingdom of Vesterland which first appeared in the Breaking Boundaries arc from the comics.
The story goes that Sissel and Inger hated one another and Inger was jealous that her sister was next in succession to become queen and one fateful day, she drowned her older sister. So, she could become queen herself. When her actions had been learned of she was taken away on a prison ship away from her kingdom and stripped of her title.
Such a harrowing story of how jealousy can consume but as we will learn it was all a fabrication made up by Elsa and Anna’s grandfather so that he wouldn’t have anyone to oppose the dam he wanted to build that led to the Northuldra people being blocked off for years.
Both this book and Dangerous Secrets expand upon Runeard and make him one of the most vile Disney Villains in my opinion. That is saying something as he is only in Frozen II in a flashback that barely lasts two minutes.
As Elsa says rather late in the book when they find a living Inger, they tend to do a lot of apologetic for the actions of their grandfather. This is very much a sin of the (grand)father where even though Anna and Elsa weren’t alive when Runeard committed these heinous crimes, they have to live with the knowledge of their grandfather being an awful man who would have most likely killed his eldest granddaughter if he had seen her magic.
Soon after the story Kristoff tells of the dragur, Olaf claims he saw her and is being chased. At first, the girls do not believe him and tell the snowman that there is no such thing. Girls, one of you has magic and you faced a nightmare monster in a previous book, this isn’t out of the realm of possibility. However, Anna sees the creature herself and it is moaning “sissster” and it keeps saying this along with “You’re wronng” and the way it is stretched out sends a shiver down the spine of the reader and does make you fear for Elsa and Anna. This at first leads Anna to think that the dragur is mad at her for taking the crown from her older sister much like what the story of Inger and Sissel tells. Sinister Sissel as she is called travels through all of Arendelle robbing the people of their memories. To the point, Kristoff forgets he is even engaged to Anna. (Could you help me forget Lost in the Woods? Least favorite Frozen song tbh). Now, this movie does use what Frozen II introduced of water holding memories and Elsa being able to look into the past with her magic. On the one hand, water does not hold memories but on the other hand, this is a fantasy story so I’m okay with magic stuff.
This does aid the girls in figuring out the truth of what happened fifty years ago so it is a nice aid even if Elsa’s powers are on the fritz. That’s something I’ve noticed between this book and Forest of Shadows, they’ve felt the need to either de-power Elsa or limit her use of her magic to make the threat more legitimate. It seems a bit odd considering how much the first movie is about her coming to terms with her powers and not being afraid of them. I do get it from a storytelling perspective as if Elsa seemed too overpowered, these threats would be no issue. Still from a character standpoint, this does bug me as Elsa’s powers are a big part of who she is and while having it on the fritz isn’t as bad as her need to suppress her magic in Forest of Shadows, it still feels a bit wrong. Don’t misunderstand me as I love this book but that’s an issue I can’t ignore. Getting back to the water memory thing, this does lead the sister on a journey to discover the truth of what happened all those years ago. This is something I appreciate as a Frozen fan as it feels like checking in with all these past characters that I’ve come to love from the other books. I also like how we are introduced to new characters that had a connection to Helga and Olga who were the caretakers of Sissel and Inger. And if I read their interactions correctly, they seemed to have been a married couple as well. So yay for a lesbian couple in Frozen, still holding out for Elsa and Honeymaren.
The way Helga and Olga speak of the Vesterland sisters shows how much they loved the Vesterland sisters and don’t buy the story that has been told that besmirched Inger’s name.
“They felt like family”, Olga finished. “Inger always acted like the older one–a tad bossy as I told her, with Sissel as quiet as a mouse. But”–Olga shrugged –Sissel was older, and it was her duty to take the throne, so Inger helped her as best she could”.
This shows much these two Inger and Sissel and they would go to great lengths to help right the wrongs of the past. This leads into another interesting angle of how history can be built upon likes and it will take the next generation or the one after them to reveal the truth. This is very much the case of what happens in this book as they find a witness who was there the night Inger supposedly drowned Sissel and we learn that was coerced by Runeard into lying about what happened that night. This man named Sitg was promised a shepherd’s farm by the king if he agreed to go with the lie and it had been eating at him for the past fifty years. He eventually comes around to reveal the truth.
“I am so sorry, princess,” he said. “He threatened me, yes, but that is no excuse for my behavior. Or for hiding the truth all these years”.
Yeah, Elsa and Anna’s grandfather was a real piece of crap guy. He would do anything to get what he wanted including framing a neighboring queen for killing her sister. If I ever do a Villains Profile on him, I’ll have a lot of options for his worst deed. This book doubles down on what we learned from Dangerous Secrets in that his marriage was a loveless affair and his wife escaped while leaving her son behind as she couldn’t take him with her. However, she did help Inger escape from the prison ship and Inger would soon become a pirate. This ties back to an earlier point about how pirates had been swarming Arendelle. It turns out Inger and her granddaughter, Red.
No, not her but that would be awesome. However, this does tie into something in the article about dragurs I brought up about how these undead creatures are drawn to a location that was of importance to them in life.
In folktales, many draugr have some type of connection to burial mounds. They are deceased loved ones who come back to life in their graves or tombs, with the primary purpose of protecting the treasures that they were buried with.
Sissel is constantly drawn to where she was drowned as that is so often where she returns and while she is not protecting a treasure, she is trying to save her sister from the besmirchment she has had to endure for all these years and in doing so after learning of the truth, Sissel is freed of her dragur form and is finally able to rest while Vesterland sets up a musuem to tell the truth of the Vesterland sisters. Inger is offered her title back by the current king of Vesterland but she had been at sea so long that is where she would rather remain. Overall I enjoyed this book and while it does have some spooky elements, it is more of a tragedy in many ways helping these sisters.
My Final Thoughts
This is one of my favorite Frozen books, it’s in the top tier but honestly, the list changes around on which is my favorite favorite. Still, this is a great book of looking into the past and helping to right the wrongs of the previous generation. The supernatural element with the dragur is fun too, now if you want something a bit more spookier, Forest of Shadows is the better choice but this is still a good supernatural book featuring these characters I love and I cannot reccomend it enough. Join me next time for one last Disney book as we head back to the Haunted Mansion for…
Haunted Mansion: Storm & Shade
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