Fear, Failure, and Redemption

#1 NYT bestselling author V.E. Schwab shares her own author character arc

By Anna Faller | Sept. 30, 2023

Bestselling author Victoria “V.E.” Schwab wants to make you believe in magic. “I’m inspired by speculative elements of our world—that it’s bigger or stranger than it is,” she explains.

Reality, though (think: power, politics, and people), often makes for just as fascinating a story as any made-up creature or villain. It’s the intersection between real and imaginary that much of Schwab’s work aims to explore. “That’s where you, as the reader, can believe magic might be possible,” she adds.

Tune in on Saturday, Oct. 7, as she takes the National Writers Series stage for a truly enchanting conversation.

Writing the “Weird and Unapologetic” Books

Like so many authors, Schwab has always known she wanted to be a storyteller. How to tell those stories, though, took years of trial and error to determine. This is because she was—and remains—overwhelmed by the full-length novel format. “They just feel too long for me,” she explains. “I find [writing those stories] extremely daunting.”

Schwab, however, also has what she calls a “deeply adversarial” relationship with fear. Once she realized her mind was the obstacle, the author (then in her second year of college) resolved to take the bull by the horns. “I made myself sit down and write my first book. It was terrible,” she admits, “but I got to the end of it, and then I was hooked. I had to do it again.”

Since then, she’s penned more than 20 books, including the acclaimed Shades of Magic series, the Cassidy Blake trilogy, and the international bestselling novel The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Netflix even made one of her short stories into a series: First Kill, a teenage vampire drama.

In that time, Schwab’s own character development has followed a “weird redemption arc based on spite.” Contrary to what many readers might assume, Schwab wasn’t an overnight success. In fact, she nearly gave up publishing after her first three books were killed in succession. “But before I quit,” she says, “I was going to write one more book, and I was going to stop trying to write anything that anyone else cared about.”

That book was Vicious (2013), her breakout adult novel all about the great and terrible power of modern-day superheroes…and of those who seek to destroy them. The book was an intended expletive to Schwab’s experience in the publishing industry. What it wasn’t supposed to do was sell—which is exactly what it did. From there, though, it took another five novels before A Gathering of Shadows, the second in the Shades of Magic series, charted as her first bestseller in 2016.

Fast forward seven years, and Schwab is finally seeing her dedication pay off, with the success of series like Shades of Magic and most notably Addie LaRue—which sold one million copies its first year in print—highlighting a readership that took years to build.

“I think that’s one of the only reasons my career works,” Schwab says. “It’s really weird and unapologetic, but I’ve cultivated an audience that expects that from me—that I’m going to try something new each time.”

The Fragile Threads of Power

That’s exactly what she’s done in her newest book, The Fragile Threads of Power. Schwab returns to the alternate London of her popular Shades of Magic series with a fresh cast of characters and more than a few hair-raising adventures.

The concept for the novel, which is an indirect continuation of the preceding Shades of Magic books, occurred to her about halfway through writing A Conjuring of Light, the trilogy’s third and final installment.

(Some context here: Shades of Magic is set in an alternate world wherein London comprises four magical realms—White, Grey, Red, and the ominous Black—all of which hang in a delicate balance as their inhabitants grapple for power and glory. At the center are a dwindling race of magicians with the power to travel between parallel worlds. The books unfold as a core cast of characters fight for the worlds they call home…and to stay alive in the process.)

As Schwab tells Northern Express, the arc was only supposed to cover three books—that is, until she spied a plot hole that she could use to return later on. She explains, “I realized that I either had to resolve [that part of the story] in less time than I had; or I could leave it and it could become an ellipsis.”

Suffice to say, she chose the latter.

Schwab prides herself on never telling the same story twice, a difficult feat when writing in the framework of a fantasy world you not only created, but to which your readers are deeply connected. “I wanted Threads of Power to feel essential,” she explains, and not just a continuation of a story based on past success.

To avoid that, she’s introduced a few new faces to accompany the original cast. There are also new motivations afoot, both for Schwab as well as her players’ end game.

“One of my personal philosophies is that a character should not feel continent upon a reader’s attention,” she notes. In other words, Schwab wants you to believe that her characters go on living outside her books. To do that, Threads of Power pins them against a host of real-world conflicts; like industrial revolution (through the scope of magic), innovation, and how we move forward in time.

One thing that hasn’t changed, however, is the gratitude Schwab has for her readers. “I hope Threads of Power feels like coming home, and I hope they feel the love in that,” she adds. “I try very hard to write for myself, but [this book] would not have been possible without readers loving and holding space for these worlds.”

About the Event

“An Evening with V.E. Schwab” takes place on Saturday, Oct. 7, at 7pm at the Lars Hockstad Auditorium (TCAPS Central Grade School, 301 W. 7th Street) in Traverse City and via livestream. Tickets range from $40-$65 plus ticket fees and come with a hardcover copy of The Fragile Threads of Power via Horizon Books. Both in-person and livestream tickets can be purchased through the National Writers Series website. The guest host for the event will be local journalist Beth Milligan. For more information, visit nationalwritersseries.org.

Photo by Jenna Maurice