What I’m Reading: A Darker Shade Of Magic by V.E. Schwab

Fellow fantasy lovers had been recommending A Darker Shade Of Magic to me for some time. It had also kept popping up on those “if you loved this, read this” lists, so it seemed clear the universe wanted this book to slide into my TBR pile.

I can see what the fuss is about – the concept is very clever, and very visual too. 

Here’s the premise: there are four Londons across four parallel worlds. The rest of the cities and countries are different in these worlds, but London is a fixed city in each. We have:

Grey London – our world, with very little or no magic

Red London – thriving, with magic in balance

White London – becoming overpowered by magic and fading

Black London – lost control of magic and has been shut off from the other Londons

Kell, one of two protagonists, is from Red London and is one of the last Antari – magicians with the rare ability to travel between Londons. When he gets unwittingly caught up in a plot to harness magic from Black London, he has to escape to Grey London, where he crosses paths with Lila Bard. Lila is a nineteen-year-old thief who looks out for herself, and dreams of a better life, one filled with adventure. Obviously her wish comes true when she meets Kell and gets caught up in everything that’s going on. They join forces and together set out to uncover who is behind the Black London plot, and to restore things to how they were.

If I had to describe the book in one word it would be sharp: short, sharp chapters; sharply-written characters; and a lot of sharp, knife-like descriptions (literally, many things were compared to a knife!). 

Schwab maintained a fast pace throughout the novel, and the chapter length definitely contributed to this. Most chapters were quite short, but then grouped together in sections. When reading it I would try and read until the next section, but if I didn’t have time there were lots of opportunities to put the book down and then pick it up again. It also frequently changes POV, between the two protagonists and secondary characters. At times the way the story moves from scene to scene, character to character, feels a bit like a movie. I haven’t read a book with this style before, and for me it worked.

Out of the two protagonists, Lila was my favourite. She felt more developed than Kell – she really leapt off the page, and was one of those interesting characters that make things happen, rather than react to things going on around them. As much as I liked Kell, he was almost too nice compared to Lila! It reminded me of Harry Potter, in the way that the protagonist, Harry, isn’t as interesting as the characters he’s surrounded by. I think a lot of this was due to the comparison with Lila’s character, who just oozed personality.

Overall, it was the worldbuilding that I really loved. I felt like Schwab showed just enough of the details, just enough of how the magic works, for you to get a sense of the whole world (worlds, I should say). If anything, I was left wanting a bit more of Red London – to really see what their day-to-day lives were like with magic intertwined in them.

So were my fellow fantasy-lovers right in recommending this book to me? Absolutely! It’s also the first book in a trilogy, so I’ll be getting my hands on the next books soon.

Looking for more fantasy inspiration? Read my post on Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy.