Down Comes the Night

Two enemies, each fearing the other as war ravages their countries, find themselves drawn together in hopes to end the conflict and reset reputations.

Wren is magical healer, as well as the niece of the Queen of Danu, who has lost favor after lifelong mistreatment by her Aunt. In hopes to restore her character, she accepts the invitation from a neighboring kingdom to diagnose what is taking the lives of servants at the estate of Colwick Hall.

Who she finds she must cure of the malady is the missing sworn enemy of her kingdom, the infamous Reaper of Versria, Hal Cavendish. Wren’s curious mind, draws her to Hal as she is sworn to save lives. Together they uncover a dark and sinister plot to destroy other kingdoms to bring one into ultimate power.

Down Comes the Night is a debut novel that is a dark, gothic YA fantasy with a romantic plot that is slow to build. Be patient, let the story unfold then you will NOT be able to put it down.

This book was a recommendation by an author. YA fantasy is NOT what I typically select to read. Overall, I’m was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed Down Comes the Night.

Wonderfully written and delightfully creepy, Down Comes the Night is a stunning gothic debut reminiscent of del Toro’s Crimson Peak. It tells the story of *disaster bisexual* Wren Southerland who has a heart of gold, a brilliant scientific mind, and very little common sense. Choking under the yoke of her imperious Queen-Aunt, Wren strikes out on her own, fleeing to Colwick House: the crumbling rural estate of an eccentric foreign Lord. Snowed-in and tasked with healing his ailing servant, Wren soon discovers things are not as they appear and it is not so easy to tell ally from enemy.

The magic system in this world was extremely interesting and unique. Magic users have a second network of veins called “fola” that carry magical energy throughout the body. Saft dedicated a lot of focus on the medical/scientific functions of magic since Wren is a healer, which was quite refreshing to find in a YA fantasy novel. Religion and politics are adequately explained (standalone) and easy to understand/ follow along with. Culture is a bit glossed over, but is not all that important since the important meat of the story takes place in Colwick House. These sinister surroundings are described perfectly, and evoke an ominous unknowable “other” that leaves a creeping feeling up the reader's spine. Like Wren, I too felt like I was being watched.

The main villain was entirely too cartoonish and very obvious from the jump. I was quite literally picturing them twirling their handlebar mustache and holding their cape up like Dracula. Queen Isabel was a rather lackluster, though critical, character. I would have loved to have gotten some more descriptions of her history and intent through flashes of personal experience. It felt like far too much of her was explained in the context of her sister, Wren’s mother. She truly felt like a “Paper Queen”- she was rather dimensionless and rang flat.

Wren’s endless compassion actually grew to be a bit much by the end of the novel. The lesson in Down Comes the Night seems to be that compassion is the greatest asset in this compassion-lite world, but there needs to be some balance here. Yes, the world as a greater whole needs to be more compassionate; but this also left Wren stagnant and without any real character growth. Wren from the first page and the last page is more-or-less the same person; only the people around her developed in any lasting meaningful way.

Down Comes the Night is a beautifully-written atmospheric love letter to gothic mansions and snowed in horror scenarios. I loved it and I am very interested in reading Saft’s future work