Inspired by Beauty and the Beast and the myth of Hades and Persephone, this lush and enchanting enemies-to-lovers fantasy romance is perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas, Jennifer L. Armentrout, and Scarlett St. Clair. Wren of Edgewood is no stranger to suffering. With her parents gone, it’s Wren’s responsibility to ensure she and her sister survive the harsh and endless winter, but if the legends are to be believed, their home may not be safe for much longer. For three hundred years, the land surrounding Edgewood has been encased in ice as the Shade, a magical barrier that protects the townsfolk from the Deadlands beyond, weakens. Only one thing can stop the Shade’s fall: the blood of a mortal woman bound in wedlock to the North Wind, a dangerous immortal whose heart is said to be as frigid as the land he rules. And the time has come to choose his bride. When the North Wind sets his eyes on Wren’s sister, Wren will do anything to save her—even if it means sacrificing herself in the process. But mortal or not, Wren won’t go down without a fight… The North Wind is a stand-alone, enemies-to-lovers slow-burn fantasy romance, the first in a series sprinkled with Greek mythology.

This stunning New York Times Bestseller from the survival story master, set along a rugged coastline centuries ago, does for the ocean what Hatchet does for the woods, as it relates the story of a young person’s battle to stay alive against the odds, where the high seas meet a coastal wilderness. When a deadly plague reaches the small fish camp where he lives, an orphan named Leif is forced to take to the water in a cedar canoe. He flees northward, following a wild, fjord-riven shore, navigating from one danger to the next, unsure of his destination. Yet the deeper into his journey he paddles, the closer he comes to his truest self as he connects to “the heartbeat of the ocean . . . the pulse of the sea.” With hints of Nordic mythology and an irresistible narrative pull, Northwind is Gary Paulsen at his captivating, adventuresome best.

In Norway, the cold winds blow from the north. But when the wind blows away the flour carried by the baker’s young son, he sets out on a journey to insist it be returned. Themes: perseverance, intelligence.

At the Back of the North Wind is a children's book by George MacDonald. It is a fantasy centered on a boy named Diamond and his adventures with the North Wind. Diamond is a very sweet little boy who makes joy everywhere he goes. He fights despair and gloom and brings peace to his family. One night, as he is trying to sleep, Diamond repeatedly plugs up a hole in the loft wall to stop the wind from blowing in. However, he soon finds out that this is stopping the North Wind from seeing through her window. Diamond befriends her, and North Wind lets him ride on her back, taking him on several adventures. Though the North Wind does good deeds and helps people, she also does seemingly terrible things. On one of her assignments, she must sink a ship. Yet everything she does that seems bad leads to something good. The North Wind seems to be a representation of Pain and Death working according to God's will for something good. George MacDonald (1824-1905) was a Scottish author, poet, and Christian minister. He was a pioneering figure in the field of fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow writer Lewis Carroll. His writings have been cited as a major literary influence by many notable authors including W. H. Auden, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Walter de la Mare, E. Nesbit and Madeleine L'Engle. G. K. Chesterton cited The Princess and the Goblin as a book that had "made a difference to my whole existence".

Who do you think is stronger – the Sun or the North Wind? They both found themselves in a dispute because they both thought that they were strongest. They saw a traveler who was just passing by and they decided that whoever made the man remove his cloak would be proclaimed the strongest. A winner is declared. Who will it be and what is the moral of the story? Find out in Aesop’s fable "The North Wind and the Sun". Aesop's fables feature animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that speak, solve problems, and generally have human characteristics. All the stories story lead to a particular moral lesson. Aesop (620–564 BCE) was a storyteller that was believed to have lived in Ancient Greece. He is celebrated for a number of fables now collectively known as Aesop's Fables. In the few scattered sources about his life, Aesop was described as a slave who by his cleverness acquires freedom and becomes an adviser to kings and city-states. Although Aesop's existence remains unclear, numerous tales credited to him were gathered across the centuries and in many languages in a storytelling tradition that continues to this day.

"The North" is simultaneously a location, a direction, and a mystical concept. Although this concept has ancient roots in mythology, folklore, and fairy tales, it continues to resonate today within modern culture. McIntosh leads readers, chapter by chapter, through the magical and spiritual history of the North, as well as its modern manifestations, as documented through physical records, such as runestones and megaliths, but also through mythology and lore. This mythic conception of a unique, powerful, and mysterious Northern civilization was known to the Greeks as "Hyberborea"--the "Land Beyond the North Wind"--which they considered to be the true origin place of their god, Apollo, bringer of civilization. Through the Greeks, this concept of the mythic North would spread throughout Western civilization. In addition, McIntosh discusses Russian Hyperboreanism, which he describes as among "the most influential of the new religions and quasi-religious movements that have sprung up in Russia since the fall of Communism" and which is currently almost unknown in the West.

"On Midsummer Eve, 1865, more than 30 Finnish and Sami immigrants disembarked from a Great Lakes ship to a place called Hancock, Michigan. At the time, Hancock consisted of nothing more than a small cluster of humble buildings, but it was here, on the outskirts of mid-19th-century civilization, that Finnish settlement in Michigan's Upper Peninsula (UP) took root. Much to the surprise of these new Americans, Midsummer was not a religious holiday marked by feasts in celebration of the season's prolonged sunlight. Rather, the newcomers were immediately hastened into the bowels of the earth to extract copper in pursuit of the American Dream. In short order, hardworking Finnish immigrants became reputable miners, lumberjacks, farmers, maids, and commercial fishermen. A century and a half later, the UP boasts the largest Finnish population outside of the motherland and sustains the determined spirit the Finns call sisu--an influence that remains palpable in all 15 UP counties."--