Siege and Storm

Although Siege and Storm portrays a largely fantastic world that isn’t defined by a single time period or country, Bardugo borrows heavily from 19th-century European history to create Ravka and its citizens. Much like Alina’s world, due to rapid changes in the culture, technology, religion, and politics, the real 19th century seemed swift-moving and intimidating to those who inhabited it.

Throughout 19th-century Europe, reform movements and revolutionary forces advocated for better outcomes for the lower class; wealth gaps were extreme, and countries offered almost no safety nets or protections for their most vulnerable citizens as poverty tended to be seen as emblematic of moral failings. This sharp division between the haves and have-nots also occurs in the novel, seen in the villages that lead to Os Alta.

Nineteenth-century scientific discoveries led to rapid industrialization in the form of factory production, and innovations like the radio, intercontinental cable, electric lighting, automatic weapons, and dirigibles. This advancing technology is represented in the novel by inventions like the Hummingbird, a vehicle that can fly and sail, and use machine guns; moreover, David’s mirrored discs that enhance Alina’s natural amplification echo the 19th-century push for scientific progress in general. Technology had social ramifications. For example, transportation advancements—such as the steam engine and the ocean liner—made travel easier, but this often resulted in tensions as ethnic groups butted heads living side by side in new cities, something that plays out in the novel’s focus on the mistrust that exists between the Ravkans, Fjerdans, Shu Han, and Zemini.