Gallant by V.E. Schwab
Olivia Prior knows hardly anything about her family or where she came from. Raised at the Merilance School for Independent Girls, the only link she has to anyone outside its walls is her mother’s journal — a slim, worn volume that offers very few answers as she watches her mother’s words, and the series of strange ink drawings between them, seemingly devolve into madness with the turn of every page. More peculiar is the final entry, a rather lucid letter addressed to Olivia that ends, “you will be safe as long as you stay away from Gallant.”
AN INVITATION TO DARKER HORIZONS
She’s read the journal backwards and forwards thousands of times over the years but can make neither heads nor tails of her mother’s warning … until a new letter arrives. An uncle she never knew existed has summoned her home to the Prior family estate, summoned her home to Gallant. The elation of discovering family becomes mixed up in the caution her mother’s journal implores her to take. Nevertheless, she has little choice but to go. When she arrives, she finds no uncle. The estate is in disrepair, and no one, not the paltry staff nor her disgruntled cousin Matthew, had been expecting her.
Now a somewhat unwelcome guest, Olivia is determined to uncover the secrets Gallant is concealing, even if Matthew continues to insist on her leaving. And if the estate’s few living souls refuse to grant her the answers she seeks, perhaps the ghouls that haunt this place can point her in the right direction — to a small, crumbling wall at the back of the grounds, the purpose of which is a mystery, as is the locked door at its center.
Schwab’s latest feels like a fairy tale dressed in irresistible black, like the glittering surface of dark water that draws you to its sheen but makes you wary of what might lurk beneath. Gallant possesses all the magic and mystery readers have come to expect from Schwab along with a gently ominous atmosphere and a poignant meditation on home and belonging.
READERS HOLD THE KEY, SCHWAB DARES THEM TO FIND THE LOCK
Oh, and for all you bibliophiles who prefer your books with a side of book, Gallant is one of those special tomes that boasts another within its pages. As the story moves along, readers discover passages from Olivia’s mother’s journal, featuring the gorgeous and haunting illustrations of Manuel Šumberac. The novel becomes a puzzle of sorts as Olivia (and the reader) attempts to piece together the clues concealed within the journal. And as soon as you’ve seen the complete picture, the only sensible decision is to start all over again, delighting in the details you missed on your first read-through.
But perhaps the most exciting aspect of this novel is that it can be enjoyed by anyone. I’d wager that every reader, be they middle-schooler or middle-aged, will leave Gallant powerfully affected by Schwab’s storytelling. For me, her words don’t just describe magic, they create magic, they are magic — keeping my own “creative door propped open,” as Schwab herself likes to say, and beckoning me to explore stranger worlds.
