Title: A Conjuring of Light (Shades of Magic Book 3)
Author: VE Schwab
Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Tor Books, Tom Doherty and Associates
Publication Date: February 2017
Page count: 637 pages

Rating:

A Conjuring of Light is the third and final book in the Shades of Magic series by VE Schwab and it was my favourite installment. I’ve always said that VE Schwab has such a beautiful style of writing. Her books evoke a lot of feeling, and the prose feels poetic at times. It’s the type of writing where I’ll write down quotes or passages as I read them because they’ve resonated that much. I was so excited to get to this book and it didn’t disappoint.

Fair warning: spoilers ahead for anyone who hasn’t read this or the other books in this series.

A Conjuring of Light picks up where A Gathering of Shadows left off with Red London in crisis. Kell is dying at the hands of Holland and Osaron in White London, Rhy in turn is dying in Red London as a result, and Lila is desperately trying to find a way to get to Kell in time to save them both.

I appreciated that from the very first page of this book, Schwab dove directly into the action and didn’t let up. She’s already accomplished so much world-building through the first two novels that by the time we get to the third, she’s able to focus specifically on plot and character development, which is really where things got good for me. Kell, Lila, Rhy and Alucard all run headfirst into trying to save themselves and their worlds, and for the first time, we also get to see the perspective of Holland, who quickly grows to be one of my favourite characters. An anti-hero from the start, Holland’s tragic personal history weaves beautifully through the narrative and adds an extra layer of emotion to the events unfolding in both Red and White London.

Over the course of the book, we get to see Kell begin to feel more confident in who he is (and less whiny, which I appreciated), Lila develops a heart, but still maintains her sharp edges, Rhy grows into the role that’s expected of him, and comes to find a semblance of peace for how his life will always be intertwined with another, and both Alucard and Holland, flawed as they are, find relatively natural and fitting resolutions as well. Of course, there’s a lot of ups and downs to get here as the characters traipse across the whole of the Red London world, but Schwab manages to cover a lot of territory through the rotating perspectives. I absolutely loved this choice to rotate perspectives through all major and some minor characters, even including King Maxim and Queen Emira, and found the short format of the chapters particularly enjoyable. It kept the plot and action moving at a really quick pace without losing out on the complexity of the emotion or struggle across characters, backgrounds, and worlds.

The only aspect of the book that sat a little uneasy with me at the end was that it felt like there was so much unexplored potential. While the pacing of the plot was fantastic, I would have liked to have seen a little more complexity—after all, there are three full worlds that Schwab has created throughout this series, and most of the attention in this book is dedicated to Red. There were also threads of substories, like Kell’s family prior to the Maresh’s, that didn’t get fully told but that I would have loved to see explored. That said, I know Schwab has another trilogy for the Shades of Magic world in the works, so it’s possible some of the strands I wanted to see unravelled will be done there.

As a whole, this was a really enjoyable series for me with an exceptionally original premise. I’ll definitely be picking up the next book in the Shades of Magic universe when it releases.