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

This review of Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, by one of my favorite fantasy authors V.E. Schwab, first appeared in the May 2025 Historical Novels Review. I concluded this review thus, “the literary virtuosity glues the reader exquisitely to each page.” Enjoy!

Three Women, Many centuries

Schwab’s historical fantasy intertwines three women whose collective story and individual lives span centuries. Maria’s story opens in Santo Domingo de la Calzada, Spain, in 1532, Lottie’s in London 1827, and Alice’s in Boston 2019.

Schwab’s masterful characterization of each, differentiated by their distinctive voices, creates the emotionally compelling core from which unfurls the novel’s driving force: each woman’s response to her transformation into a near-immortal and violent creature. Schwab’s vampires provide rich, unexpected loam in which to explore human yearnings for love, sustenance, and freedom. Vampires in Schwab’s skilled hands have expectation-defying depth, whether a reader usually loves or hates vampires. Relationships between women and the dynamics of control and need are central to this brilliant dive into the human heart.

Integrating Character with Style

Schwab seamlessly integrates character with style, different and evolving for each woman. The language is period-appropriate but goes well beyond that. Alice’s 2019 narration sounds contemporary with hints of stream-of-consciousness (adroitly startling after Maria’s voice in 1532 Spain). But also, the reader feels Alice’s struggle to find and become herself—her doubts and powerlessness—in the piling up of “when” and “and” clauses in this example: “It’s because there’s a moment, pressed beneath the weighted blanket of the storm, when her body stops fighting, when all the voices inside her finally go quiet, and her shoulders loosen and her lungs unclench and her skin goes numb and the line between girl and world gets smudged, and she is washed away.”

Will these women find and hold onto their deepest desires? Who and what will they destroy in the process? Those plot strands drive the reader forward, but the literary virtuosity glues the reader exquisitely to each page.

Further Reading

If Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil appeals to you, you may also enjoy reading my review of Rust in the Root by Justina Ireland, a fantasy twist on American history and the role of Black Americans.