Even in world with magic, Charlie is aware that to be normal means fitting into a very narrow box–one that’s hard to find when you’re poor and have a past like hers.

Delving deeper into the world she thought she’d left behind, Charlie quickly learns that danger doesn’t just lurk in the shadows–sometimes it’s the shadows themselves in Book of Night (2022) by Holly Black.īook of Night is Black’s adult market debut.Ĭharlie is a pragmatic main character, having survived her share of hard knocks and dealt a few herself along the way. When the worst parts of her past come back to haunt her, Charlie’s boring stable life is thrown into chaos. Simple.Įxcept you don’t get into the spell market without building a reputation, without meeting unsavory characters, without sometimes being the unsavory character. What Charlie can do is take a boring stable job tending bar, spend time with her boring stable boyfriend Vince, and make sure Posey’s tuition is paid on time. She can’t stop her younger sister Posey from searching online for traces of magic at all hours, can’t stop Posey from splitting her own tongue so she’ll be ready when her shadow wakes up. Which is why Charlie is more determined than ever to start fresh. She might have become a different woman if she didn’t move so quickly from small cons to the much bigger cons of stealing long hidden, very dangerous spells.īut some bullets can’t be dodged. Her life would have taken a different course without shadow magic and the underground market it created for stolen shadows, arcane spells, and–most importantly for Charlie–hidden knowledge. They didn’t need to convince you of anything, because you were too busy convincing yourself.”Ĭharlie Hall remembers the way things were before magic was real.

Holly black book of night review