Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab

A book I couldn’t put down. A book that had me shaking my mouse all day so my work laptop thinks I’m in ‘focus mode’. A book I described to Sam before bed just so I could talk to someone about it.

Amazing. Effervescent. Heartbreaking. What would you do for power? How far would you go to stop being an object, prey, and start being a predator? Read this book if you want lesbian vampires throughout the ages.

The true beauty & mastery of Schwab’s book is that you get every character. I understand Maria/Sabine. You feel for Lottie. But you know they’re doing bad things. And you know they’re evil and killers and bad. Lottie is so selfish with her need to love and fuck and feel closeness. Sabine is possessive and egotistic and had lost her humanity. Alice was just a bystander who didn’t know the rules and decided to commit murder & get her revenge. You love everyone, though, and you know they’ve all suffered at the hands of the patriarchy & homophobia. But it makes you wonder how far you can go to get even.

Is a woman becoming a predator a “feminist win”? Or is it more killing and suffering? And of course all of this is wrapped in beautiful prose: descriptions of cherries that had me longing for Traverse City and wishing to experience Venice in Carnival and feeling lucky to live somewhere I can experience torrential rain.

This was my first VE Schwab book but damn this won’t be my last.