Victoria Schwab (or V.E. Schwab) is a popular writer of supernatural and fantastical YA fiction. I read her Shades of Magic trilogy a few years ago because it was well received, but I was not particularly impressed by it and thought it was just okay. And then I read The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, which leans more into adult fiction, and I absolutely loved it. This made me decide to give Schwab’s other books another try, and so I read This Savage Song. Like the Shades of Magic trilogy, I thought This Savage Song was just okay. I think I need to move on from reading YA supernatural fiction.

This review is supposed to be about This Savage Song, but I must take a moment to appreciate The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue as I read it before I started this blog. The Invisible Life of Addie LeRue is about a young woman in early 18th century France who makes a bargain with a devil: her soul in exchange for eternal life. There is a catch, of course, which is that Addie will be immediately forgotten by everyone who meets her. It is a fascinating story that spans centuries up to the present day, and Addie is an impressive heroine that learns to leave her mark on the world despite being forgotten by family, friends, lovers. It was one of my most anticipated reads in 2020, and it did not disappoint. I highly recommend it.

Now back to This Savage Song. It is set in a city called Verity in an alternate version of the US that exists in a world that is also inhabited by monsters. The monsters in This Savage Song are basically three different versions of vampires, excepted they are created by acts of violence, not by humans being turned into them: the Corsai, which are the most monstrous looking and cannot survive in the sunlight; the Malchai, which look more human but are still monstrous enough that you can tell they are not; and the Sunai, which are the most rare of the monsters but also the most like humans, and they feed off the souls of sinners.

The city of Verity is divided into two halves: the southside, which is run by the Flynn family with the help of the Sunai, and the northside, which is run by a human mobster named Callum Harker who controls the Corsai and the Malchai, and who will provide protection to humans for a price. There is a truce between the southside and the northside that each stick to their own side of the city, but it seems that someone or something wants to break that truce and start another war.

August Flynn is a Sunai that has been tasked with infiltrating a school on the northside so that he can keep tabs on Kate Harker, daughter of Callum Harker, in case the southside needs leverage against Harker if another war breaks out. August does not like being a monster; he does not like feeding off the souls of sinners. He wishes he were human, but if he does not eat, then he will “go dark” and kill everyone in his proximity, including innocents. Kate is, on the face of it, a stereotypical badass that burns down schools and threatens other students, just so that she can be brought back to Verity and prove to her father that she belongs by his side. Once she figures out August is a Sunai, she plans on capturing him to bring him to her father. But things do not go as Kate planned, and of course both she and August find themselves running for their lives, learning how to work together to survive and developing feelings for each other.

This Savage Song pretty much smacks you upside the head with its thesis of who the real monsters are in the world. It is entertaining enough and a quick read, but it is definitely meant to be appreciated by the YA audience.