Book Review on ‘The Bone Season’ by Samantha Shannon

The world of fantasy fiction got blessed with a new series in mid 2013. Bloomsbury, the erstwhile publishers of JKR’s Harry Potter series, recognized yet another author with a flair for fiction and published the first of the series of seven a few years back. The Bone Season was recommended to me by a dear friend and avid reader; book recommendations from her have never gone wrong.

From the moment I started reading this book, I was sucked right in. The theme is clairvoyance, the setting a postmodern world where the “voyants” live in hiding lest the “rulers” of their society imprison them and the year of the story setting off is 2059. Clairvoyance is clearly classified into seven orders at the very outset so the reader gets a fair enough understanding of the way clairvoyance works. The fantasy is well woven into the more realistic world. The author has put a good deal of thought into the scientific and political field of the period; both fields are addressed in bits and pieces throughout the story, keeping the reader engrossed.

The protagonist is Paige Mahoney, a young adult fashioned after the generic protags of most fantasy fictions these days. She is plain yet outstanding, she has a complicated love life and is quite possibly special (as in the chosen one) in the grand scheme of things that the readers/fans haven’t entirely figured out yet. Clairvoyance is considered a disease in the world of our protag. The voyants live under cover much like the mutants of Marvel. The non-voyants go through life more or less unaware of them. The protag’s father happens to be a biochemist who is pretty high up in the government that’s trying to find a “cure” for clairvoyance while keeping the public shielded from the truth. And all the while the father is completely in the dark about his daughter’s covert life.

The story takes a turn for the better when Paige is whisked away to a secret city hidden from the outside world and then is selected to be trained to fight some flesh eating spirit aliens. The entire socio-political structure undergoes a paradigm-shift as Paige enters the life in the hidden city.

Parallels can be drawn between several famous characters from several different series such as Snape from HP, Haymitch from The Hunger Games and quite unfortunately a certain cold blooded being that the world now detests with characters in the novel. The similarities are subtle yet evident to fans. The book, being the first in the series, is setting down the groundwork for what promises to be a very thrilling series. Readers are eager to devour the works as they make their way out of the press. The series has put Bloomsbury once again on the watch. As several popular fantasy tales are coming to a close (most importantly GoT), the readers of fantasy fiction will have something to look forward to, putting much pressure on the young author Shannon. The writing and the emotions of the characters are very in step with the world today, which will make readers feel a kinship towards the protag. A major revelation by one of the characters at the very end will rather please a certain colourful community (IYKWIM).