Holly Black’s Adult Debut Novel, Book of Night. Credit blackholly.com A great read for any fantasy or thriller fans, this book balances humor and action with hilarious, multilayered characters.
“Charlie’s fingers closed around the bat and she pushed herself to her feet, shaking with adrenaline and fear and rage.
With no good ideas, she was going to go for the bad one.
They better carve that on her tomb. The Charlie Hall credo.” – Holly Black, Book of Night
As summer fades in the rearview mirror, Mayfield students may find themselves in a book slump with the slow draining of their spare time for evils such as homework and tests. Don’t despair! YA author Holly Black’s Book of Night will fix your start of autumn slump. Black’s latest novel is an Adult Fiction debut, and lives up to the high praise and recommendations for her more famous series, Goodreads Choice Awards nominee The Cruel Prince trilogy.
Book of Night has all the action, comedy, and out-of-this-world plot twists of Black’s trilogy, with the familiar blending of reality and twisted settings she’s famous for. From the first page, Holly Black throws the reader into a sideways world parallel to our own: the same setting we might expect in our own neighborhood, but layered with an added concern.
Set in a dilapidated modern day east coast town, the story is right on the heels of a new revelation: shadow magic. The manipulation of shadows to appear different, or to move independently or even to kill someone, is on the rise. Young delinquents turn their attention to sketchy internet theories on how to quicken shadows to gain these diabolic powers, while upstanding citizens scoff but live in fear of seeing it themselves, and being robbed of their own reflections. Shadow theft and the exchange of books on the topic occupy the black market, making the more skillful thieves rich – if they don’t get caught.
The Charlatan is one such con artist, one of the best-known in those dubious circles for being the best at stealing books on shadow magic, if the price is right. However, outside of her job, the Charlatan is just a girl, with her own problems trying to pay the bills. Charlie’s dark set of skills came from dark roots, a past which is explored every few chapters, and does nothing to help when she attempts going straight and abandoning thievery for the sake of the people she cares about. Charlie reasons that the danger isn’t worth the pay but she knows the real reason: she likes it too much. However, after a mysterious death and a strange customer willing to pay any price for the theft of a specific book, Charlie throws her life into the crosshairs one last time for a final job.
Black’s writing is fast-paced and tense, adding levels of emotion that make it impossible to put down. Her protagonist’s ill-timed humor and ill fortune make her lovable and easy to invest in, trusting her bad decisions as though they are your own. Readers all can relate to the plausible ideas we think are doable, and the confidence in our abilities, especially in that moment when it all falls apart.
Every new chapter holds a twist, as the world Black weaves is so similar to our own and so full of dark but tempting opportunities, that readers will wish the two could mesh into their own reality. Her imagination runs wilder than anyone could follow, pulling plots that nobody could anticipate, and every character plays a precise and complicated role in the delightfully twisted humor and drama of Charlie’s gamble.
The strange combination of harsh reality and decadent fantasy makes each scene at once compelling and confusing, leaving every reader hanging on for more. Black’s writing holds the promise of a strong outline and well thought out word choices, before throwing expectations to the wind in hopes of reaching everything the characters could ever dream of– or losing it all in one fell swoop.
For a fast-paced, dark humor fantasy novel that blends the setting with descriptive worldbuilding, give Book of Night a try. Charlie’s loveable spirit and countless costly mistakes will break your book slump after just a single chapter.
4.75 paws
