Book 56: "Winter Rose" by Patricia McKillip

I turned, walked into the hot noon light, and saw him, with his pale gold hair and light-filled eyes, riding his horse the color of buttermilk across the green grass, as if he were human as the rest of us, not something that had stepped out of light into time.

This book is a past winner of the World Fantasy Award and I can well see why, as it is full of marvellous descriptions of nature and faerie which draw you into this wonderful fairy tale.

The wild woods around Lynn Hall contain gateways into faerie, and from the moment that Rois sees Corbet Lynn appear out of the light by the rose-covered well, she knows there is something not quite human about him. She is consumed by curiosity about his grandfather's death and the curse that he laid on Corbet's father before he left the village, and jealous of Corbet's feelings for her sister Laurel.