A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E Schwab takes place over three different worlds, each varying in levels of magic all possessing a copy of the same city of London. Each city being named for a different color, only called this by those rare few Antari who possess the power to travel between them. Grey London, the world that we know, is a world without magic at all. Filled with smoke from the rising economy of England in 1819, ruled by a mad King George the lll, and swarming with thieves and crooks such as Lila Bard. There is Red London, home of Kell, one of the rare Antari who travels other worlds and his, which is flush with magic as an everyday instrument. Finally there is White London, the world that once had wonder that is now bone dry, chased back into the earth by its abusive inhabitants, and ruled by two cruel twins that keep the only other known Antari, Holland, as a pet.
Diving in you find yourself caught in between these three worlds, and yet a looming presence hangs over all of them. An ancient fourth world, Black London, the world that was consumed by its own magic and burnt itself to a crisp. To stop it from spreading to the other worlds it was sealed off and any remaining trace of it was destroyed, except a singular piece that Kell stumbles across when he finds an artifact from Black London while he’s secretly smuggling magic to places that have none. Possessing such a dangerous item leads him to make new friends and enemies while threatening to bring the four worlds crashing down around him while he tries to protect those he loves.
This is the first book in easily one of my favorite series of all time, by my favorite author of all time. It’s the perfect introduction to these worlds of wonder, magic, and trickery where the characters truly thrive and take on a new dimension that is rarely seen in literature. I consider myself to be a tough grader at times, however, this book and its series as a whole is one of the few books that I would give a 10/10 rating to because it was just perfect in all the ways that I believe makes a book great. There’s so much amazingly written action, love, suspense, and of course such an interesting plot. I know I’m being kind of vague here but it’s such a good book and I don’t want to spoil it but still encourage others to read it. I can’t state enough how much I love Schwab’s work and especially here she plays around with the idea of a “main character” and will make that concept more fluid that can change which characters it encompasses and what POV you’re reading from. With so much personality and history in each person I found myself rooting for all of them, good and bad, cheering for their fates like it was a sports event.
In conclusion, this is one of my favorite books I’ve read and there’s honestly not a single aspect of it that I would change given the chance. Everything about it is, in my opinion, a perfect young adult adventure fiction book, even taking on a pirate vibe later in the series that somehow fits so well when the setting has been mainly on land for the majority. I did say young adult because there are definitely some violent scenes and a spicy one later on in the series. The concept of these parallel worlds is something I love because even though they all feel similar the rest of the worlds are so different and diverse compared to each other, especially with them all having varying levels of magic. And in case you couldn’t tell how much I love this book, I never re-read books because I don’t want them to not be as good the second time and ruin it, so I waited 2 years after I read this the first time so I would forget the plot and could read it again. It was just as good the second time, but that’s how much I love this book. Of course this is a heavily biased and opinionated article, but this is a website for recommending beloved books so of course I'm rambling this much about how amazing this book is. Overall, A Darker Shade of Magic is the perfect book with amazing settings, characters, and a page-turner plot so good it will make you want to wait 2 years just to experience it again. I will probably revisit it in 2026 and I highly recommend this book.
