Audiobook. Teen/YA plot structure but spooky enough and well constructed, well told story of a girl who has grown up in an orphanage, then finds herself invited to the home of her uncle, where things rapidly evolve - the invitation is not what it seems, her family may not be the home she has dreamed of, and something sinister in an alternative world is trying to get in...

Nice audiobook listen, good narrator. I wouldn't have picked it up in hard copy but it entertained me while cooking and walking to work!

Themes of family, communication, and loyalty.

The Secret Garden meets Coraline. Gallant is essentially about life and death.

“Death comes for everything”

This novel is incredibly atmospheric  and detailed, so much so that it does create a movie in your head. However, because of how detailed visually the book seemed to be written as, I felt as though the character development with the main character, Olivia, fell flat. The pacing took too long in getting her accustomed to Gallant, that by the third act I was already bored, even with her meeting

Death

. Even with the found family trope of the book, it felt cliche and forced. I felt as though the author could have done more with her bonding with her found family, and maybe create a balance in her finding out about her parents and appreciating her found family. I genuinely think that this would make a great movie, but as a novel, it did fall flat. 

What was that ending?
I have to admit I was expecting more...

I mean, it was a fitting ending to the story, but at the same time I felt it rushed. 
And my question is... What is going to happen to Gallant once Olivia is not there anymore? What if she decides to have children? 

I liked Olivia as a character, she was interesting to read, how she could picture and feel the world around her. She felt real, a curious girl who has always wanted something and is finally getting it, although not as she expected. 
Matthew was very human. He was afraid and tired of everything.  You can definitely see how that shaped his actions throughout the book. 
Edgar and Hannah were mostly side characters, and didn't have much relevance to the actual plot, but I liked them. 

This book was dark and I was expecting some closure at the end, however, as I mention at the beginning, the ending was fitting for the type of story and the information given to Olivia. We as readers know the same about Gallant as she does. Therefore making her actions understandable and not childish or rash, since Olivia was filled with curiosity for a world she did not know anything about. 

I would have liked to rate the book higher, but I was expecting a bit more of action at the end and I would have liked more information about her parents. Still, in real life we don't always get the answers we seek. 

My summary:

Olivia Prior has been at the Merliance boarding school since she was two years old, where she was left on the steps with nothing but her mother’s journal. Now 14, a letter arrives from an uncle summoning Olivia home to Gallant—the one place her mother’s journal warned her away from. Olivia has no choice but to go to Gallant despite her mother’s warning, but her dread is mixed with the promise of having a family and a home. 

My thoughts:

Gallant by V. E. Schwab (a.k.a. Victoria Schwab) is a dark, young adult, fantasy standalone novel. This is not a genre that I typically read but I love Schwab’s writing so much that I wanted to read some of her backlist while waiting for her next release. Her writing is very lyrical and I enjoy the style of it. 

I found this to be well written but a little creepier than I prefer my books to be. Overall I enjoyed it, but it’s just a bit outside of my comfort zone of the typical books that I read. A couple of the plot points were a bit hard to follow but it is worth the read. 

I was first introduced to V. E. Schwab’s  writing with the Invisible Life of Addie LaRue and I adore that book so much. It was the first fantasy book that I had ever read and it opened the door for me to read and love other fantasy books since then. I have since read her Darker Shades of Magic trilogy and then her new spinoff of that series, The Fragile Threads of Power, which I especially enjoyed. 

A simple yet hauntingly beautiful story