I like to theme my reading around the seasons as far as I can, and what better thing to post in the run-up to Christmas than a list of best books set in the wintry north? The first five are books which I have very much enjoyed and would highly recommend, and the last five are those which are high on my wishlist.
1. The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Andersen ***** (Various parts of Scandinavia)
2. The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey ***** (Alaska)
3. Naive. Super by Erlend Loe ***** (Norway)
4. The Winter Book by Tove Jansson ***** (Finland)
5. The Siege by Helen Dunmore **** (Russia)
6. The Red Scarf by Kate Furnivall (Siberia)
7. With the Lapps in the High Mountains: A Woman Among the Sami, 1907-1908 by Emilie Demant Hatt (Northern Sweden)
8. Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy (Siberia)
9. Victoria by Knut Hamsun (Norway)
10. The Crow-Girl: The Children of Crow Cove by Bodil Bredsdorff (Denmark)
Which are your favourite books set in the north?
theliterarysisters 
I’ve just read “Riding the Iron Rooster” by Paul Theroux, and parts of that involve his travelling in the north of China in winter. His descriptions of the cold make you freeze down to your bones. They are just brilliant!
That sounds fabulous, Caroline! I presume that China in the wintertime is beautiful, and I am so glad that Theroux seems to have evoked the cold so well.