Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab

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Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab

Fantasy

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

Repeat author

by V.E. Schwab

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Quick take

Sink your teeth into this dark and deliciously gothic vampire novel by the author of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, 400

    400+ pages

  • Illustrated icon, LGBTQ_themes

    LGBTQ+ themes

  • Illustrated icon, Nonlinear_Timeline

    Nonlinear timeline

  • Illustrated icon, Salacious

    Salacious

Synopsis

This is a story about hunger.

1532. Santo Domingo de la Calzada.

A young girl grows up wild and wily—her beauty is only outmatched by her dreams of escape. But María knows she can only ever be a prize, or a pawn, in the games played by men. When an alluring stranger offers an alternate path, María makes a desperate choice. She vows to have no regrets.

This is a story about love.

1827. London.

A young woman lives an idyllic but cloistered life on her family’s estate, until a moment of forbidden intimacy sees her shipped off to London. Charlotte’s tender heart and seemingly impossible wishes are swept away by an invitation from a beautiful widow—but the price of freedom is higher than she could have imagined.

This is a story about rage.

2019. Boston.

College was supposed to be her chance to be someone new. That’s why Alice moved halfway across the world, leaving her old life behind. But after an out-of-character one-night stand leaves her questioning her past, her present, and her future, Alice throws herself into the hunt for answers . . . and revenge.

This is a story about life—

how it ends, and how it starts.

Content warning

This book contains scenes depicting sexual assault and the death of a child.

Read a sample

Get an early look from the first pages of Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

I

Santo Domingo de la Calzada, Spain

1521

The widow arrives on a Wednesday.

María remembers, because Wednesdays are for bathing, and her hair takes an age to dry after it’s been washed and combed. She remembers, because it is warm for the end of April, and she is sitting in a patch of sun at the edge of the yard, sucking on a cherry pit (one of the first of the season) and holding a lock up to the light to see if the hair is turning darker, or if it is simply still damp.

María’s mother says she is becoming too vain, but then, her mother is the one who makes her go to bed each week with clay in her hair, hoping it will mute the glaring strands. As far as María can tell, it isn’t working. If anything, the hair looks even brighter.

She would not mind so much, María’s mother, if the hair were honey-colored, or earthy, even auburn, but such an angry shade of red, she says, is a bad omen. Not a warm color, but the hot orange of an open flame. One she cannot seem to douse.

Something tickles María’s shin. A thread has come loose on the hem of her dress, and she will have to ask her mother to fix it. Her mother is a seamstress, small fingers making perfect lines. The trick to sewing, she is always telling her, is patient hands and patient hearts, but María came into this world with neither. She is always pricking herself with the needle, losing her temper and flinging the work aside, half-done. Born restless, her father used to say. Which was fine for a son, but bad for a daughter.

María rolls the cherry pit along the inside of her teeth as she pulls at the thread, unraveling her mother’s patient heart a little more, when the church bells begin to ring.

And just like that, the day is suddenly more interesting.

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Why I love it

This might be the hardest “Why I Love It” I’ve ever had to write. When I love a book this much, it’s hard to find the right words to do it justice. I could write about the toxic lesbian vampires that are absolutely the reason I picked up this book. Or I could tell you about the lush, beautiful writing that had me savoring every page. I could also talk for hours about the themes of feminine rage and hunger that haunted me long after I finished reading.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil follows the story of three women through three time periods. There’s María, who is wild and wants to forge her own path in life. There’s Charlotte, who spends her days in London’s high society until she sees a different future for herself when she receives an enticing invitation from a widow. And then there’s Alice, who searches for answers about the mysterious girl she met at a college party one fateful night. As each woman goes on her own journey, they will all discover a hunger that lives deep inside them.

If you loved Schwab’s 2020 BOTY finalist The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, you’ll be thrilled to hear that she weaves an equally brilliant story here in Bury Our Bones. It’s an intoxicating read filled with complex, flawed characters that will leave you spellbound until the final pages.

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Member ratings (5,214)

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400+ pages
View all
The River Is Waiting
This Princess Kills Monsters
Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil
My Friends
Home of the American Circus
Silver Elite
The Bombshell
Gifted & Talented
Enchantra
Oathbound
Rebel Witch
We All Live Here
First-Time Caller
Babylonia
The Favorites
The Thirteenth Child
Homeseeking
Most Wonderful
The Courting of Bristol Keats
Pictures of You
PS: I Hate You
The Road of Bones
Intermezzo
The Dagger and the Flame
The Wild Huntress
The Crimson Crown
Here One Moment
Phantasma
The Pairing
All the Colors of the Dark
The God of the Woods
Same As It Ever Was
The Demon of Unrest
Five Broken Blades
Real Americans
Table for Two
The Familiar
A Short Walk Through a Wide World
Just for the Summer
The Wives
A Fate Inked in Blood
The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard
The Fox Wife
The Mayor of Maxwell Street
Ready or Not
Heartless Hunter
The Women
Family Family
Ruthless Vows
Gwen & Art Are Not in Love
The Frozen River
The Future
What We Kept to Ourselves
Wellness
You, Again
Happiness Falls
Shark Heart
Love, Theoretically
The Only One Left
The First Ladies
Ink Blood Sister Scribe
Warrior Girl Unearthed
The True Love Experiment
Did You Hear About Kitty Karr?
Yours Truly
Hello Beautiful
I Have Some Questions for You
The Last Russian Doll
The Shards
Hell Bent
Age of Vice
A Wilderness of Stars
Babel
The Circus Train
Before I Let Go
Bloodmarked
The Last Party
Foul Lady Fortune
Sign Here
Thistlefoot
Bronze Drum
The It Girl
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
The Wedding Dress Sewing Circle
Part of Your World
Lessons in Chemistry
The Good Left Undone
Kaikeyi
True Biz
Booth
Peach Blossom Spring
Black Cake
Will
Still Life
The Keeper of Night
The Book of Magic
The Lincoln Highway
Apples Never Fall
In Every Mirror She's Black
Damnation Spring
One Last Stop
Half Sick of Shadows
The Girl with Stars in Her Eyes
What Comes After
In a Book Club Far Away
The Four Winds
Black Buck
The City We Became
The Prophets
Legendborn
The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
Friends and Strangers
Evicted
The End of October
The Book of Longings
The Great Believers
Yes No Maybe So
Anna K
Red, White & Royal Blue
Ninth House
The Fountains of Silence
Frankly in Love
Permanent Record
The Reckless Oath We Made
The Boy and Girl Who Broke the World
The Gifted School
Free Food for Millionaires
Ask Again, Yes
All the Light We Cannot See
Sky Without Stars
Night Music
Small Fry
One Day in December
Nine Perfect Strangers
The Clockmaker's Daughter
The Great Alone
The Heart’s Invisible Furies
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
A Million Junes
The Nightingale
Behold the Dreamers
A Gentleman in Moscow
The Secret History
Salt to the Sea
Palace of Treason