Status Updates From Captain of the Steppe

I'm reading the first chapter of five different books, and then I'll predict my final star rating and ranking before I proceed to read all of them. I've now read the first chapter of the first book, Captain of the Steppe, which I think I'll find funny and engaging and will give four stars. Let's see if I'm right..

Khabarov loved a quiet, frozen winter: things were fine, then, both outside and within your soul. In such a winter, the huts on the Russian flatlands are wreathed in stove smoke, just like incense. The villages on those huge expanses stand covered in hoarfrost and immersed in the tall silence of the heavens.

It was only by the appetising smells that Khabarov worked out they had fried some meat and were eating it, with a side dish of potatoes.
They had killed the guard dogs and, once they were skinned, the soldiers had fried and eaten them, as if unsentimentally disposing of something that had outlived its usefulness.