I’ve been hooked on Holly Black since I first read her Young Adult fantasy series in 2002. That’s when Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale was published. She followed that up with Valiant in 2005 and completed the trilogy with Ironside in 2007. If you’ve never read these stories, I suggest you do.
Holly Black and her friend, Cassandra Clare are the Empresses of Urban Fantasy. Clare beta-reads Black’s manuscripts and, I assume, Black returns the favour. How cool is that?
After writing YA and middle grade stories for the past twenty years, Black is now venturing in the realm of adult books. This is her debut Adult fiction. I don’t really know the difference. In Book of Night the sex is not explicit, and there’s minimal profanity and violence only when warranted. It’s certainly nothing that would surprise teens and I’m sure they’ll be all over this book. Perhaps, it’s because her protagonist, Charlie Hall AKA The Charlatan, tends bar at Rapture and seems to be in her early twenties.
Black is a #1 New York Times best-selling author and Book of Night will illustrate why. Her concepts are original, her descriptions electrifying, her characters unique and relatable (even in their weirdness). I inhaled this book as if possessed. Here’s the blurb:
Charlie Hall has never found a lock she couldn’t pick, a book she couldn’t steal, or a bad decision she wouldn’t make.
http://blackholly.com
She’s spent half her life working for gloamists, magicians who manipulate shadows to peer into locked rooms, strangle people in their beds, or worse. Gloamists guard their secrets greedily, creating an underground economy of grimoires. And to rob their fellow magicians, they need Charlie Hall.
Now, she’s trying to distance herself from past mistakes, but getting out isn’t easy. Bartending at a dive, she’s still entirely too close to the corrupt underbelly of the Berkshires. Not to mention that her sister Posey is desperate for magic, and that Charlie’s shadowless, and possibly soulless, boyfriend has been hiding things from her. When a terrible figure from her past returns, Charlie descends into a maelstrom of murder and lies.
Determined to survive, she’s up against a cast of doppelgangers, mercurial billionaires, gloamists, and the people she loves best in the world―all trying to steal a secret that will give them vast and terrible power.
The cover is brilliant! Simple but striking, the font one of my favourites. I actually just used it on my romantic suspense novel Lure. It’s called Cinzel Decorative.
Twisted and gritty with a dash of kink, Book of Night will keep you flipping pages despite burning eyes and sagging lids. Why?
Lyrical language with strokes of hilarity. A to-die-for original premise. Intricate world building. A strong sympathetic protagonist who loses track of her lover, Vince, early on, and must face these dark, deceiving villains on her own. Charlie Hall is intelligent, witty, fearless, and skilled, though flawed by her past.
Black moves between past and present as they are intimately connected; something that really connects the reader with the character. If you can let go of this book, you will want more.
With all the hallmarks of urban fantasy—part-mystery, part-thriller, a dash of delicious fantasy, and a sprinkling of sexy—it’s perfect.
*****
P.S. For the most part I read books for review. When I get a chance to choose my own staycation adventure, I go to my favourite authors. Hence, Holly Black.
Sounds like a great book!
Wonderful. As an urban fantasy author, you should definitely read her work. I’m going to reread her first YA series soon. Just because.
Wow! I love that premise! That font is wonderful too.