Editorial Content for The Shadow Society
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Abandoned at a fire station at the age of five, sixteen-year-old Darcy doesn’t remember anything before her life as a foster child. This year things are finally going to be different. Not only has her foster mother offered her a home for another year, it will be the first year she will return to the same school and be able to count on a solid and steady group of friends. But something about Darcy unsettles people. Her case file is filled with strange occurrences and omissions. Darcy herself is struggling with hallucinations that she is disappearing, as well as vivid drawings of a place she knows, but has never visited.
"THE SHADOW SOCIETY will appeal to fans of supernatural romance as well as detective fiction."
The dramatic opening scene of Marie Rutkoski’s THE SHADOW SOCIETY --- involving a knife-wielding foster mother and a bad news boyfriend --- does not prepare the reader for what happens next. Darcy is a Shade, a creature from another dimension able to make herself invisible. Hunted by agents who suspect her of being a member of a terrorist organization dedicated to the elimination of humans, Darcy is spirited away to an alternate universe where the Chicago Fire never happened. It is a place where Shades are second-class citizens who must live underground. Believing it to be her only way to get home, Darcy becomes a double agent, at once supposed to infiltrate the Shadow Society as well as complete their missions. This position makes it possible for Darcy to see both sides of the conflict: the humans who have suffered under terrible attacks and the Shades who are hunted in the street. Loyalties torn, Darcy no longer knows who or what she is, or what secrets might be uncovered from her past.
Even though THE SHADOW SOCIETY has elements of supernatural romance --- a brooding love interest and a heroine possessed of uncanny powers --- I felt that in many ways it was more akin to detective noir fiction, where the central protagonist does not fully understand her own identity or the ways in which she is implicated in the crime she is investigating. The reader is limited by Darcy’s perspective, which means we don’t solve the mystery until she does. Consequently we are as surprised as she is by the events of the novel as they unfold.
Marie Rutkoski's previous work is The Kronos Chronicles, a trilogy of fantastical middle-grade novels centered in an alternate version of Renaissance Prague. It has gypsies, pirates, and sentient mechanical creatures. THE SHADOW SOCIETY is a much more focused book, but shares elements of Rutkoski’s other works, including an interest in alternate universes and technologies. The world she creates in THE SHADOW SOCIETY bears striking similarities to our own, but also has shocking differences. For example, instead of electricity, it’s powered by magnetism. But one of the greatest pleasures of THE SHADOW SOCIETY are scenes where Darcy explores works or art and literature that are different in this alternate universe than they are in our own. Imagine reading a Jane Austen novel never discovered in our world. Or seeing a haunting painting by John Singer Sargent --- clearly inspired by his well-known and controversial work Madame X --- that in Rutkoski’s alternate Chicago is a picture of a Shade, recognizable by her pallor, dark hair and black eyes.
Rutkoski uses T.S. Eliot’s poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," throughout THE SHADOW SOCIETY. Initially assigned as a class project at school it becomes a touchstone for Darcy as she struggles with her identity, her feelings, and the actions she must take that put her hard won security at risk. The question asked in the poem, “Dare I disturb the universe?” becomes all the more significant when we realize that the actions take in one world may also impact the next.
Of course, I’m skipping over a great deal here, including descriptions of Darcy’s love interest, her loyal and lovable group of misfit friends, and several key plot points I don’t want to reveal lest it spoil the surprise of reading the book. THE SHADOW SOCIETY will appeal to fans of supernatural romance as well as detective fiction. Comparable titles include Holly Black’s Curse Workers series, which also blends noir with a kind of magic. Best for readers over the age of twelve, THE SHADOW SOCIETY is a stand-alone title with a hopeful and satisfying conclusion. Rutkoski continues to grow as an author; I look forward to what she does next.
Teaser
Darcy Jones doesn’t remember anything before the day she was abandoned as a child outside a Chicago firehouse. She has never really belonged anywhere—but she couldn’t have guessed that she comes from an alternate world where the Great Chicago Fire didn’t happen and deadly creatures called Shades terrorize the human population. In this smart, compulsively readable novel, master storyteller Marie Rutkoski has crafted an utterly original world, characters you won’t soon forget, and a tale full of intrigue and suspense.
Promo
Darcy Jones doesn’t remember anything before the day she was abandoned as a child outside a Chicago firehouse. She has never really belonged anywhere—but she couldn’t have guessed that she comes from an alternate world where the Great Chicago Fire didn’t happen and deadly creatures called Shades terrorize the human population. In this smart, compulsively readable novel, master storyteller Marie Rutkoski has crafted an utterly original world, characters you won’t soon forget, and a tale full of intrigue and suspense.
About the Book
What if everyone thought you were a freak of nature? What if they were right?
Darcy Jones doesn’t remember anything before the day she was abandoned as a child outside a Chicago firehouse. She has never really belonged anywhere—but she couldn’t have guessed that she comes from an alternate world where the Great Chicago Fire didn’t happen and deadly creatures called Shades terrorize the human population.
Memories begin to haunt Darcy when a new boy arrives at her high school, and he makes her feel both desire and desired in a way she hadn’t thought possible. But Conn’s interest in her is confusing. It doesn’t line up with the way he first looked at her.
As if she were his enemy.
When Conn betrays Darcy, she realizes that she can’t rely on anything—not herself, not the laws of nature, and certainly not him. Darcy decides to infiltrate the Shadow Society and uncover the Shades’ latest terrorist plot. What she finds out will change her world forever . . .
In this smart, compulsively readable novel, master storyteller Marie Rutkoski has crafted an utterly original world, characters you won’t soon forget, and a tale full of intrigue and suspense.
