With The Dark Mirror, Samantha Shannon’s Bone Season Series Becomes the Fantasy Saga Our Moment Requires
It’s been four years since the release of The Mask Falling, the fourth installment in bestselling author Samantha Shannon’s Bone Season series. The arrival of the saga’s fifth book, titled The Dark Mirror, is certainly long-awaited, and fans everywhere have no doubt been dying to finally get the chance to return to the story of dreamwalker Paige Mahoney and her otherworldly ally-turned-lover Arcturus Mesarthim. But the most striking thing about this installment—which, let me just get this out of the way, is excellent—is how unexpectedly timely it feels and how perfectly tuned to our current moment its story happens to be, despite its wildly fantastical premise.
Of course, this probably isn’t terribly purposeful. Publishing is a notoriously unpredictable business with colossally long lead times, a release calendar that always seems to be in flux, and authors (like Shannon!) who prefer to take years between titles. No one involved in the writing of this book had any idea that The Dark Mirror would arrive right now, at a moment in which authoritarianism is on the rise around the world, dictators are seizing power, and broad questions about who governments are meant to serve are running rampant. And, yet, it also seems hard to imagine a more necessary moment for a story like this to hit shelves. A road map for resistance, an ode to perseverance, and a bright shining ball of hope in a bleak time, The Dark Mirror is both a fantastic next step in the larger story of Shannon’s Bone Season universe and a necessary reminder that everyone has a role to play in saving the world—-or, at the very least, making it a less overtly dark and frightening place than it is at the present moment.
As a story, The Dark Mirror is different than its predecessors in many ways. Most importantly, it takes place entirely outside of Scion, and gives us our first real look at the wider world that exists free from the controlling reach of the Anchor. Countries like Spain and Portugal are busily battling Scion forces, but others like Italy (at least for the moment), still live relatively normal lives beyond its influence. For the first time, we’re asked to consider how the seemingly inexorable march of Scion’s control, the existence of clairvoyance, and even the rumored presence of the Rephaite on Earth might play to an audience of normals, and the story is full of the sort of complex political intrigue and spycraft its predecessors simply didn’t have room to tackle. The end result is a story that makes the wider world beyond Paige’s immediate circle feel thrillingly real and expansive.
The Dark Mirror picks up six months after the shocking conclusion of The Mask Falling, as Paige awakens in an unfamiliar hotel with no idea where she is or how she got there. Though she remembers the moment when Arcturus seemingly betrayed her, everything since that time is foggy, and her altered dreamscape has been altered in a way that indicates her memories have been erased or otherwise suppressed. Most surprisingly of all: Paige is no longer in Scion. She’s now in the free world, where clairvoyants are acknowledged as citizens and free to do as they please. But what has Paige been doing for the past six months? And who tampered with her memories?
As she journeys to Italy to reconnect with other resistance fighters and the intelligence network known as the Domino Programme, Paige wrestles with her memories of Arcturus, alternately berating herself for trusting him and questioning the legitimacy of his supposed heel turn. The fact that she can no longer reach him through their unique bond makes her determined to find him and get to the truth of what happened between them—and where he’s disappeared to since. But as Paige is forced to deal with more immediate problems of survival, Scion continues to stretch its influence in the wider world. Norway, seemingly out of nowhere, surrenders to the Anchor, and rumor has it Italy will be the next to fall. And when Paige learns of a new secret Scion plot known as Operation Ventriloquist, a scheme meant to overtake governments from within by controlling and puppeting their leaders using voyant abilities, the situation seems more dire than it ever has.
Outside of its obvious status as a resistance novel, The Dark Mirror is a deeply satisfying read on an emotional level. Paige displays real, hard-won growth throughout this book: Taking the counsel of others, resisting the urge to run off half-cocked on her own, and trusting those she cares about to have her back when she needs it. Her newfound willingness to discuss her feelings and face her well-documented fears is both admirable and almost entirely unexpected. Perhaps her desire to come clean, emotionally speaking—she is more forthright than she’s perhaps ever been with the important people in her life—is a natural response to a period that’s been marked by and threatened with so much loss, but it’s a relief to finally hear Paige admit that she is not an island unto herself, and that she genuinely cares for many of the people around her. Don’t get me wrong, her stubborn tenacity and refusal to give up in the face of dire odds are still omnipresent, but it’s nice to see her (finally) admit she can lay some of her professional and personal burdens down. (Or at least trust others to help her carry them.)
Given that The Dark Mirror is the fifth installment in a positively massive series, if you haven’t read the other Bone Season books recently, just prepare now to spend a fair amount of time flipping repeatedly to the (thankfully dense) glossary at the end of the text. There you’ll find reminders of various characters’ identities, as well as their histories with and relationships to both Paige and Scion. This book also has very little in the way of fantasy elements until the big battle at the very end—it reads more of as an adventure thriller, with a dash of dystopian fiction thrown on top. Perhaps that was always necessary, given our growing understanding of what Scion’s plans are and the ruthless nature of those who push its ideology forward, but it is a vibe shift that readers will need to adjust to as Shannon pivots the series toward its ending.
That said, if you’re a Bone Season devotee, there’s plenty to love here, from the welcome character growth to several genuine (and long-needed) relationship moments. And if the determined struggles of Paige and her compatriots as they fight for a better world for clairvoyants and amaurotics alike can help inspire us to face the steadily creeping darkness in our own, well. Surely, that’s no small thing.
The Dark Mirror is available now, wherever books are sold.
Lacy Baugher Milas is the Books Editor at Paste Magazine, but loves nerding out about all sorts of pop culture. You can find her on Twitter and Bluesky at @LacyMB