-
"With meticulous precision and smart, poetic prose, Meadows vaults us into the chilling and eerily relevant world of Soviet-era gymnastics. Get ready to fall in love with eight-year-old Anya, who offers us a heart-wrenching view of what it means to live, love and compete in a sport where one wrong move or the whisper of dissent can ruin you. This book is full of heart.
— Georgia Hunter, New York Times bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones
-
"Winterland gripped me from the first page. I loved this story of strong women fighting to keep their humanity in the face of terrible forces: Siberian winters, demanding gymnastics coaches, lost mothers and Gulag camps. Rae Meadows is a gifted writer, and I was thrilled to find myself in a landscape I knew nothing about, rooting for a young gymnast named Anya.
— Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Dear Edward
-
Winterland is a story as gripping as it is a powerful rendering of the true cost of perfection. In beautifully written, thrilling prose, Rae Meadows takes us deep into the world of the USSR’s gymnastics program. As we see eight-year-old Anya rise to the top of this ultra-competitive and punishing sport, the mystery of the disappearance of her mother begins to unfold. Combining a page turning plot with fully formed characters, Meadows has written a novel that reflects the current moment. I was left breathless.
— Lara Prescott, New York Times bestselling author of The Secrets We Kept
-
Rae Meadows brings the gruelling world of Olympic dreams to vivid life in Winterland, a searing tale of a young girl finding her path in Soviet-era gymnastics. Anya's childhood is centered around the mysterious disappearance of her mother, an event that anchors the book in a spiral of questions. Heart-breaking and thought-provoking, imbued with the beautiful fragility and terror of athletic excellence, this is a story of unfolding friendship and adversity that will linger with readers for long afterwards.
— Yangsze Choo, New York Times bestselling author of The Night Tiger
-
Rae Meadows always writes with absolute clarity and power, and it is a pleasure to soar through the air with her in Winterland, weightless, strong, and capable of anything.
— Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of All Adults Here
-
Meadows paints a poignant portrait of life behind the Iron Curtain, palpably conveying her vividly rendered characters’ deprivation, longing, and self-sacrifice. Fans of Megan Abbott’s You Will Know Me should take note.
— Publisher's Weekly
-
Meadows’ absorbing fifth novel follows a promising young Soviet gymnast as she enters a ruthless sports system that emphasizes winning at all costs... Writing with a confidence based on excellent research, Meadows vividly depicts the Soviet training system—and its abuses... An enlightening portrait of a now-vanished world.
— Kirkus Reviews
-
Meadows skillfully articulates the risks and rewards of high-level competition, the divine feeling of being chosen to represent one's country and the fragility of the human body... Winterland is a historic look back at a generation of Soviet talent, ambition, and sacrifice, inside and outside the gym.
— Booklist
-
Quoting aptly from the poems of Marina Tsvetaeva and liberally slinging Russian vulgarities along with gymnastics lingo, Meadows [...] captures the risks so recently headlined by Simone Biles and other champions in her fifth novel…Spanning the final decades of the 1900s, [Winterland] is a genre-bender that fluently integrates sports with accents from political and psychological thrillers.
— Library Journal
-
[A] story of an era shaped by glory and loss and about forging a life when you no longer are what you were.
— Historical Novel Society