Review: A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

I HAVE COME TO TALK TO YOU ABOUT AN ADULT BOOK.

I AM VERY EXCITED ABOUT IT.

★★★★½

Source: galley from Macmillan

Publication: Feb 24 2015, Tor

HERE IS A SUMMARY:

Kell is one of only two magicians who can travel between four different Londons—parallel Londons, three of which feature magic as a regular part of life. Kell's London is Red London, the only one that has both magic and order. He is a ward of the Red crown, an adoptive brother of sorts to the prince, and secretly, he's also a criminal. Kell has a bad habit of smuggling artifacts between the different Londons because it turns out that people from non-magical London are fascinated by magical things, and people from magical Londons are fascinated by mundane things. On one of his travels to White London, where there are a lot of shadows and two evil monarchs, Kell finds himself in possession of a powerful relic from Black London, and he knows he has to return it to where it came from—except that Black London has been permanently closed off because its magic became too dangerous.

Enter Delilah Bard, thief and aspiring Grey London pirate, who wants nothing more than adventure and renown. After picking Kell's pocket and finding the Black relic, she gets caught up on his situation and insists on coming with him to return it. Cue obstacles and enemies and magic.

HERE IS A REVIEW:

The more I think about this book, the more I love it. I don't understand. While I was reading it I liked it just fine for the first half, much more for the second half, but I wasn't prepared to shout my love for it from the rooftops. But now I sit here, having finished the book two days ago, and all I want to do is tell people about it.

Right from the start you can tell that this is going to be a solid novel, because the prose is very sure-footed and consistent. Schwab knew what she was doing when she wrote this book. She explains the world without dumping giant piles of information onto the page; she gives her characters personalities and traits primarily through their actions; and she keeps the plot going while also allowing her characters both reflection and forethought. 

If you like fantasy but struggle to get into those big, sweeping high fantasy worlds, this is the book for you. It's not really set in our world, but our world does play a part in it. You don't have to familiarize yourself with a map or strange names of places that don't exist, and the magic feels entirely organic to the Londons that have it. You won't find yourself flipping back a few pages to recall something that you had already been told, hoping to find an explanation for something else later on. Reading onward becomes a natural state of existence with this one.

If you like quirky, epic, mostly moral characters with penchants for crime, this is also the book for you. Lila Bard owns my soul right now; she's a fully fleshed-out character with a lot of hardness and a little vulnerability and enough spark to start a forest fire (good thing she doesn't live near a forest). You don't really get a sense for Kell until you see him through Lila's eyes—at which point you realize he is kind of a socially inept dork, but somehow he's full of charisma at the same time. And magic. He's really good at magic. Which comes in handy when you deal in dangerous magical artifacts that are wanted by dangerous magical monarchs. What also comes in handy: a thief who trusts no one. These two do so much saving each other.

Now, I know what you're thinking. Two main characters, one male and one female, you see each of them better through the other's eyes... must be a romance, right? WRONG.

Which, of course, is my favorite kind of romance.

You see, there is ostensibly no romance between Kell and Lila, but it is painfully, beautifully clear that there could be. That there should be. The respect and admiration for each other that they develop from enemies to not-quite-friends to okay-sure-we're-friends, all the way to fixed-points-in-each-other's-worlds, are the qualities that I look for in fictional [also real] romantic relationships. I love me a slow burn, and this is the slowest of them all—the kind where you're not even sure anyone sees it but you. But authors do these things on purpose, and trust me, you'll all see it. I know because this is exactly how I felt about Blue and Gansey — right down to the possible alternate-romance Blue/Adam or in this case, Lila/Rhy — and we know how that's going. [Aside: When I tell you a relationship reminds me of Blue/Gansey, you better take note. That is basically the highest compliment I can give.]

The main characters are the life of the party here and they could easily carry the story on their own, but as if they weren't enough, the side characters are interesting as well. I found myself attached to them despite the fact that they don't get nearly as much screen time. Rhy is the perfect foil for Kell: trusting where Kell is not, socially adept where Kell is not, and unsure how to be cynical where Kell is nothing if not cynical. I do declare that this shall be a bromance for the ages. And then there's Holland, Kell's almost-enemy, who I really just wanted to hug even though he's pretty terrifying. We've also got Barron, Lila's father-figure-person who she keeps at arm's length because she's Lila, but he is consistently there anyway, and Parrish and Gen, Rhy's guards who totally did not need to become actual characters but they totally did. Every character is a character, whether they needed to be or not.

The villains were maybe not my favorite thing about the book, but I get the feeling they were not the real villains of this story. Astrid and Athos Dane were evil, no question, but their evil didn't make me shiver. It didn't make me ponder what it means to be human, or give me nightmares—though surely they would be terrifying to look at, what with those black veins and all. All the two of them really did was prepare me for something much, much worse in the next book. Or the book after that (is this a duology or are there going to be more? SOMEONE TELL ME NOW).

And wow, I can't wait to see where Kell and Lila go next time.

Now I'm off to read the rest of Victoria Schwab's books, because strangely this is the first one I've read.