Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil is among my most anticipated new releases for 2025 (it releases June 10th). So when Tor Books sent me an e-copy, I was ecstatic. (Thank you, Tor!) VE has easily become an author who is indispensable reading. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue was my reentry into reading after long times spent not enjoying the one thing I loved most.

Bury Our Bones reignited my love for Schwab. With its haunting prose and poignant exploration of love, loss, and legacy, Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil reminded me why Schwab’s stories feel like coming home—dark, beautiful, and achingly human. Let me take you through the pages of this unforgettable tale. Where Addie’s story traversed centuries with a single, solitary thread, Bury Our Bones is a tapestry of three lives. Three young women whose stories are as deeply rooted in history as the soil that binds them. Santo Domingo de la Calzada, London, Boston. Three settings, three centuries, and three women growing high, deep, and wild. Each with teeth bared against a world that seeks to bury them.

But what makes Bury Our Bones so striking is its visceral approach to immortality. It doesn’t just ask what it means to live forever; it asks what it costs. If Addie LaRue was about fading into the background, Bury Our Bones is about digging deep, leaving marks, and spilling blood along the way. It’s darker, sharper, and, dare I say, even more unforgettable.

Even now, long after I’ve turned the last page and the dust has settled, Maria, Lottie, and Alice claw at my thoughts like restless spirits. Schwab doesn’t just write characters. She conjures them, whole and raw, leaving you tangled in their stories like a spider caught in its own web.

Maria is the escape artist, sprinting away from a past that keeps gnashing at her heels. She’s the embodiment of fight-or-flight, leaning hard into flight. She initially feels like bathing in sunlight but in turn, becomes the shadows she’s running from.

Lottie is the chaos. A wildfire masquerading as a woman, she throws herself at the world, arms wide and heart open, daring it to break her. And oh, does it ever. But there’s a beauty in her recklessness, a defiant hunger for something more, even as it scorches her edges. And then there’s Alice. Sweet, unassuming Alice, who makes the mistake of wishing for stillness in a world that thrives on change. Innocence is her first casualty, but it’s the quiet way she hardens. The way her roots twist in the soil she never meant to tend, leaving the deepest scar. Together, they’re a triumvirate of tragedy and tenacity. Their lives are interwoven in ways as messy and beautiful as the roots they share. These women don’t just grow—they dig, claw, and bite through history, leaving blood and bone in their wake. And long after you’ve closed the book, you’ll still feel their teeth.

As much as I loved sinking my teeth into Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, the one critique I have is there were moments when the story stumbled, tripping over its own roots. The pacing, at times, felt like a restless heartbeat—racing one moment and dragging the next. Some chapters sprinted ahead, breathless and wild. While others seemed content to linger too long, turning what could have been tension into tedium.

It’s not that the slow moments didn’t have value. They often carried rich, atmospheric details or introspective depth. But they occasionally felt like they overstayed their welcome, pulling down the flow of the story just when it needed to soar. Like a symphony hitting an offbeat note, the rhythm wavered, and I found myself glancing at the clock instead of losing myself in the tale. Still, even with its uneven tempo, Schwab’s talent for storytelling shines through. The missteps in pacing didn’t bury the book. They just made me wish it had taken a sharper blade to its structure. Cutting away some of the slower tangles to let the stronger threads shine.

More than anything, Bury Our Bones feels like coming home. A dark, twisted home where the soil hums with secrets and the walls are lined with teeth. These aren’t just words on a page. They’re incantations that smooth over the cracks in my world, leaving me spellbound and aching for more.

Schwab has always had a way of making the ordinary feel extraordinary, of coaxing the fantastical out of the shadows and into the light. With Bury Our Bones, she’s done it again, crafting a tale that left me breathless and bruised in the best way possible.

Reading this felt like rediscovering the magic I found in my first Schwab novel—the kind of story that burrows under your skin, fills your lungs, and refuses to let you go. It’s haunting, it’s beautiful, and it’s exactly why I keep coming back to Schwab’s work. If you’re looking for a book that bites, Bury Our Bones is it.



Set in a world both eerily familiar and eerily fantastical Bury Our Bones introduces us to women who feel quite familiar to Addie LaRue, yet stand as a story all its own. While The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue whispers of the quiet loneliness of immortality, Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil sinks its fangs into its brutal hunger. Schwab’s exploration of time feels both familiar and refreshingly feral here.

I absolutely devoured this book. Three women whose stories intersect over centuries, their roots entwined in the midnight soil, all searching for their own version of freedom and coming to terms with what it means when they find it. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I loved it.

Okay, first, can we take a moment of silence to appreciate that title?
*bows head*

Alright, moving on. This book is vampire fiction, but it’s definitely not Twilight. It’s very internal, an exploration of what it means to be cursed with insatiable hunger and to possess power you don’t want to yield. it’s a lot more literary than I expected. Very much a slow burn, a character study following three women across three centuries and three countries.

The writing and structure are excellent and you can really luxuriate in the language, but it does feel like something we’ve seen before. It’s good, but it really feels like a gender-swapped Interview with the Vampire with the lush, historical settings, angsty, existential night crawlers, and lust— right down to the LGBTQ representation. I felt like so much of what I loved about Addie LaRue was how unique it was. In that story, Addie is also grappling with the psychological and philosophical ramifications of immortality, so there’s kind of a through line connecting these two, with this being a more violent, visceral sister. The author’s writing itself has evolved in this book, but if I were to pick between them, I’d definitely go with Addie.

Overall, I’d give it a 3.5. If you can’t get enough vampire lit, then add this to your TBR. But if that’s not your niche, I wouldn’t say this is a must-read. Addie LaRue, on the other hand, IS a must-read, so if you haven’t read that, pick it up immediately.

I really wanted to love this, but some things just didn't work for me. I'm sure juggling 3 POVs is no easy feat, but it felt unbalanced with the way it was split. It made sense the way it was handled, but it took me out of the story.

The first 50% of the book focused on Sabine's story which I enjoyed, with 20% of it mixed with Alice's POV. Things don't really pick up until the 60% mark, and then we no longer get Sabine's POV, and it's now mainly Lottie's story and some of Alice's.

There was also a build up of tension and suspense in the last half of the book, only for it to end in a very underwhelming way.

Schwab does an excellent job telling this story of toxic lesbian relationships - how hard it is to get away, how selfish things can be, and how quick it can escalate. I loved that these women went for what they wanted, whether or not that resulted in chaos or good.

I do not like vampire books, I do not like vampire books....oh wait, I love this vampire book. V.E. Schwab has once again made me a fan of a genre I would not normally read. We follow 3 lesbian vampires as they love and kill their way through timelines and eras. My only complaint was that the ending fell a little flat for me.

This was an incredible book following the stories of three different women across three time periods, all with a strange and dangerous connection. It's about toxic lesbian vampires. It's about hunger, and wanting, and obsession. It's about what makes us human, and what it means to be alive.

There are hints of Addie LaRue in here, with its own unique and lyrical writing style, and its exploration of feminine desire and of dreaming of more for oneself. There are hints of Vicious in here, with a dangerous cat and mouse game that continues to escalate. The characters are rich and compelling, and I found that each timeline and POV had its own beauty to it that I was eager to read. This book made me think and it made me feel. It came so close to being a five-star read for me, but the reason I rated it four stars really came down to the pacing and the issues that created.

The first 50% of the book follows Maria for quite a long time, including details that I didn't find totally necessary, and the present-day chapters in Alice's POV also move slowly. While I found myself invested in the characters, I also found myself struggling to "get" the point of what I was reading a little bit. I think that the story would have been served better by cutting down some of this beginning portion and using the rest of the real estate to dig more into Lottie's POV. I also think more time could've been given to the final sequences of the book, as the ending felt a bit rushed in comparison to the languid (albeit beautifully written) first half of the book. I felt that with a little more time devoted to the end, the character ARCs would have felt more satisfying, especially Alice's.

That being said, I did love this book. I loved getting to know each character, and I found myself constantly flipping pages to find out how their stories connected, feeling my heartstrings pulled at everything they went through, and delighting in the delicious sapphic obsession woven into the fabric of this story.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil is a book about feminine desire, obsession, love, rage, and self-discovery. I think many of us will find parts of ourselves in it. I know I certainly did!

Thank you to Netgalley, Victoria Schwab, and Tor for providing an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed are my own!

Schwab's writing is as evocative as ever and there is much to love about her newest novel.
I enjoyed the parallels to Addie of seeing time passing across the centuries, but it also felt a bit like a different story wrapped over a reused framework a bit. I struggled to connect with or care about the characters, which is probably the biggest reason I found it dissatisfying.

I haven't read any Anne Rice but based on my perceptions of her works, this felt like a queer feminist reimagining of the Vampire genre. Which is great that that exists, but maybe that sub-genre isn't for me. Finally, time jumps between characters is a structure that I KNOW doesn't work for me, so I can't really count that against this book specifically.

I'm glad I had the chance to read this early via NetGalley and I'm sure it'll be a hit with many readers. I didn't love it, but I appreciate that it's a great story well told, even if it wasn't my favorite flavor.

VE Schwab is one of my favorite authors and I couldn't wait to read this one. It's described as toxic lesbian vampires and I loved it. It follows three women who long for something more. Who long for freedom beyond what society expects of them. Who long for power and strength. The ending felt a little abrupt but I still absolutely loved this book and already want to read it again.

Schwab is one of my favorite authors. Which means I know how she works.

I know the slowburn she excels at. I deeply love the way she uses language and its cadences to create her story. I’m always enthralled in the characters she creates and allows to grow from beginning to end.

And from around page 300 to the end, I was thriving in this book. Loving the characters. Completely hooked on the story and where it was going. I was crying by the end.

But it was page 1 to 300 that just didn’t capture me. The slowburn was simply too much during those pages, the pacing off. There were moments that spoke to me, screaming out and saying “That hit me hard” or “That was so good,” but they were scattered, not enough for me to truly feel the need to pick up the book. I loved Alice; I loved her mystery. But the rest…

I’m glad at a certain point that changed. From 300 to the end, this was a 5 star read for me. I was enraptured, in love, having a fantastic time. But I unfortunately couldn’t forget the beginning that I personally found to be a bit of a slog.

Really liked her last book. This one is not what I was expecting. It was not for me, but people love vampire books. ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by @veschwab

Releases June 10

Review: I finished this book at 1am this morning, and honestly, that’s was the perfect time. Because I sat there, I stared, I contemplated, I genuinely considering immediately rereading it. This book was everything I could have wanted and so so much more. It’s no secret that The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue is my favorite book of all time. I have a massive tattoo on my leg of my favorite quote from the book. There’s another quote from it at the top of my dissertation acknowledgements page. This book made me feel like Addie makes me feel. I found so many pieces of myself in all three main characters. I never wanted it to end as much as I desperately needed to know the ending. The writing? Absolutely luscious. It grabbed a hold of me and never quite let go. This is a character driven story at its best. WE see these characters go through and cause so much. We understand them, we love them, we hate them. We root for and against them. We live their lives with them. I always say I have two favorite books. I added another book to that list earlier this year, and here we are expanding it again. VE Schwab, you are a master at what you do, thank you for somehow writing another book that feels like pieces of my soul were sprinkled in.

Synopsis:

Santo Domingo de la Calzada, 1532.
London, 1837.
Boston, 2019.

Three young women, their bodies planted in the same soil, their stories tangling like roots.

One grows high, and one grows deep, and one grows wild.

And all of them grow teeth.

how is everything v.e. schwab writes soooo good?? I WORSHIP AT HER ALTAR!

(I actually wish it was LONGER! there's some characters I wanted to see more of (I need an Ezra spin-off or short story)!

Bury our Bones in the Midnight Soil was a hauntingly beautiful, meandering tale about traumatized toxic AF lesbian vampires. It reads slowly, very much like Addie La Rue, but I didn’t mind a single bit. Alice, Charlotte, and Sabine are all different, interesting, fully flushed out characters that each tell a tale of sacrifice, grief, loneliness, and love…with a heavy side of female rage. They are three broken women turned vampires whose stories weave a web of deceit and longing. This was vicious and gruesome at times and I was here for it.

I think many will find the longing, carnage, and angst top-tier Schwab. Read it as soon as you can.
4.5 stars

Thank you Net Galley for an eArc in exchange for my honest review.

This book was incredibly sad, showing that loneliness truly can make terrors of us all.
Despite the fabulous writing of V.E.Schwab and surprisingly violent finale, it lacked that unique quality of her previous stories. In the end, I found it to be just another vampire story. Bury Our Bones was all emotion, no magic. That being said, it was still a wonderful read. I just wouldn't read it again, thus bringing the rating down to 4 stars.

You had me at toxic lesbian vampires. You actually already had me at "VE Swchab has a new book", but the topics were a bonus.   

This has Addie LaRue vibes - slow and steady, beautiful prose spanning continents and centuries, but also Vicous-level cat-and-mouse & violence, plus vampires. 

Schwab has stated this is the most of herself she has ever put into a book and I truly felt the vulnerability dripping from these pages. There were so many moments (many relatable, though not all) that hit my heart so hard, and I thought, "This must be a piece of her, too."🥹 

I felt like Schwab packed so many words of wisdom into this, and was cheering us on to be our true selves, no matter what the world wants us to be - a message everyone needs to hear. 

I loved these characters, their unique voices, journeys, and growth. We have fierce and fearless, toxic decisions and refusal to conform to what was expected. We have insecurities, grief, loneliness, and desire. But all have a relentless hunger. 

A few of the many things you will find: 

🩸Vampires
🩸Queer rep
🩸Fierce, morally grey FMCs
🩸Toxicity
🩸Wisdom

There are SO many amazing quotes that I would love to add, hopefully I can add a couple soon.

Thank you Tor & NetGalley for this eARC, I quite literally jumped up and down screaming with bloody joy ❤️

I really really wanted to love this. Especially because it’s Schwab. But. This was… aggressive. There’s A LOT of murder to the point that it gets tiresome. I also felt this was longer than it needed to be. It took a while to pick up. Like at 50% is when things start to actually get interesting. But then things don’t really change. It’s the same thing over and over and then when it ends it’s not exactly the worthy build up.

This book is everything I've missed since Addie LaRue, but with so much more WANTING, and rage, and teeth. It takes us through stunning places and historical periods, following along with the intertwined lives of the three protagonists. The storyline jumps from past to present to in-between, building a mystery which is only solved in the last few pages. An absolute joy!

This book was incredible! VE Schwab is truly a master story teller. This book is very character driven and follows 3 different women (vampires) across centuries. It was truly captivating and had me constantly wondering what would happen next and how the story would conclude. Overall, I absolutely loved it!

Phenomenal book! I've been oversaturated with vampire novels and have given them up, but decided to request this one. I'm so glad I did! I loved the pacing, story and would absolutely recommend!

Gothic, sapphic vampires. If that sounds appealing to you, then sink your teeth into this luscious fantasy. V.E. Schwab’s writing is rich and atmospheric, painting a lush picture of cities and times spanning centuries. This book toys with traditional vampire tropes, using nuance in expectation to build tension between characters, but largely plays within the rules of vampire lore. Her characters are strong and complex, searching for independence and love that is often forbidden.

Jumping between characters and timelines, the story was slow to start, and it wasn’t until about halfway through that I was fully hooked, but once I was invested, I devoured the rest of the story. Highly recommend this book for anyone who is a fan of toxic sapphic love stories, good old-fashioned vampires, or V.E. Schwab’s glorious writing.