Review by natekka - Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.

natekka 's review for:

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

4.25

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I was bouncing between a high 4-star, possibly even a 5-star rating throughout this read. Until I got to the last 100 pages. I loved a lot of things about this book — V.E. Schwab's prose, which is gorgeous, the

vampire lore, which I found interesting and as original and unique as vampire lore can be

, and Maria's and Charlotte's stories, for the most part. But a lot of things fall apart upon inspection, when you stop and really think about them.

What let it down the most, for me, was the ending.

It felt so... abrupt. Maria/Sabine was built up so much to be this calculating, omnipotent being. She had been a shadow over Charlotte's entire vampire life for so long that I thought her ending would be a little more... interesting, or tense, or something, anything. I knew Charlotte would probably have to get someone else to kill her, but I thought there would be a bit more back and forth when it came to the actual moment.

And then for Alice to kill Lottie as well??? I was gobsmacked. Charlotte was by far my favourite of three main character in terms of likability, so for her to die like that, it felt... hugely anticlimactic. Then Alice, after mourning her old life for about 2 minutes is just... fine? I guess? I suppose there's supposed to be something poetic about it, or history repeating itself or starting again, but I don't know.

I did like the way the story was told from the three main characters' perspectives, over different time periods. It worked well imo.

I also liked the way the narrators dropped away as the story ceased being Sabine's story, then ceased being Charlotte's story as Alice claimed it for herself, refusing to be a pawn in the other two vampires' stories. Unfortunately, I just did not like Alice all that much, which made the ending more bitter than sweet. Honestly, I liked all of the side characters more than Alice tbh. Her personality and her story just did not draw me in. I was not interested in the flashbacks to her past with her family and especially her sister, Catty.

I enjoyed much of the first 450 pages or so. I liked Maria/Sabine's early journey

with Renata and Hector, then Matteo and Alessandro, and even as she became the story's antagonist as her relationship with Charlotte evolved, I was still enjoying the overall story and how it was unfolding. I really liked Charlotte/Lottie and was rooting for her happiness and freedom from Maria/Sabine. Unfortunately, it felt inevitable that story belonged to Alice by the end, not Charlotte, so she never got her happy ever after. I was left feeling like I didn't get closure regarding Charlotte. She very much felt like her own character, rather than just part of Alice's story. That being said, I did get a sense of unreliable narrator from Charlotte in the closing chapter so, who knows if I was attached to Lottie of 2019 or Charlotte pre-Penny, before the "selfish" one night stands. Idk idk.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of reading it, which is why I didn't rate it lower than a 4-star despite picking it apart after finishing.

Content Warnings