With The Dark Mirror (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook), author Samantha Shannon is presenting the fifth book in her seven part dystopian fantasy series The Bone Season.
In the following email interview, Shannon talks about what inspired and influenced both this Ancient Greek myth-inspired alt-history series and this fifth installment, as well as where things stand with the final two books.
Photo Credit: Louise Haywood-Schiefer
For people who haven’t read any of the books in The Bone Season series, what is this series about, and when and where do these stories take place?
The Bone Season is a dystopian fantasy series inspired by several Ancient Greek myths, most notably that of Hades and Persephone.
It takes place in a version of our world where the British monarchy was overthrown in 1901 and succeeded by the totalitarian Republic Of Scion, which systemically hunts and executes clairvoyants: people with the ability to tap into the spirit world in a variety of ways.
The first book begins in the year 2059, by which time Scion is an empire, controlling nine European countries. The narrator, Paige Mahoney, is a young Irish clairvoyant with a rare ability called dreamwalking, which allows her — in theory — to project her spirit from her body and possess other people. To protect herself from Scion, she’s spent three years in the criminal syndicate of London as the right hand of the notorious White Binder, one of the lords of the clairvoyant underworld. But one night, Paige accidentally kills two Scion operatives with her gift.
Instead of being executed, as she expects, Paige is transported to the lost city of Oxford, where she discovers the reason Scion was founded, and why it targets clairvoyants. So begins an epic journey…
And then, for people who have read the previous books, and can ignore me writing SPOILER ALERT, what is The Dark Mirror about, and when does it take place in relation to the preceding book, The Mask Falling?
It begins about half a year after the end of The Mask Falling, but it only feels like minutes to Paige, because her memory of those six months has been erased.
She finds herself outside Scion for the first time since she was a child, but has no idea how she got there. One of the main challenges she faces in The Dark Mirror is finding out what happened to her, and why, and to track down Arcturus, her devoted friend and bodyguard, who seems to have disappeared off the face of the Earth.
Her journey takes her to Venice, where she discovers the existence of a sinister new Scion military plan called Operation Ventriloquist. Paige and Arcturus each have skills or knowledge that could help counter it, but first they need to reunite after their brutal separation.
When in the process of writing the other books did you come up with the idea for The Dark Mirror?
This has always been a septology in my head, so I’ve had a rough outline for this book since I was 19, when I wrote The Bone Season. I cut one major thread from this one, as it just didn’t end up suiting the person Paige has become since I created her, but otherwise Book 5 has remained the same since 2011.
How do you describe The Dark Mirror and this series, genre-wise?
All of the Bone Season books fall under the broad umbrellas of dystopia and fantasy — the fantasy veers between epic, paranormal and urban — but the secondary genres vary between books. The Bone Season was a jailbreak, The Mime Order was a murder mystery, The Song Rising was a fast-paced heist, The Mask Falling was political intrigue, and The Dark Mirror is both a road trip and an espionage thriller. The mix of genres is my way of keeping a long series fresh and exciting and stopping readers from being able to guess too much of what happens next.
You said earlier that this series was, “inspired by several Ancient Greek myths, most notably that of Hades and Persephone.” Was The Dark Mirror influenced by anything else?
The Hades and Persephone influence starts to come to the foreground in this one; “Persephone” is the title of Chapter 30.
Other Greek myths that play a part are those of Orpheus and Eurydice, Prometheus and Pandora, and Kassandra of Troy.
In terms of books, the main influences on the series were The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, and Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell.
What about non-literary influences; was The Dark Mirror influenced by any movies, TV shows, or games?
Maybe a touch of Assassin’s Creed for this one, given the heavy Italian influence. I listened to the score of Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood a lot while I was writing this.
As you mentioned earlier, your plan for The Bone Season series is for there to be seven books. Do you know yet what the other two will be called or when they’ll be out?
I know exactly what the last one will be called, but I’m still trying to think of a title for the sixth, which I’m hoping to get out in 2026. It will be a miracle if I manage it, because I’ve never published two books in consecutive years, but I’ll be working as fast as I can without compromising on quality.
I’m not sure when Book 7 will be out, but I know I don’t want to rush that one, because I want the finale to bring all the threads together perfectly.
Now, my understanding is that there were plans to do an adaptation of the series. Where do things stand now?
After a couple of deals with producers and studios over the last decade, the rights to the series are currently back with me. I’d absolutely love it to be a TV show or a video game, and my U.S. agency has been pitching it to producers and developers, but I have no concrete news at the moment.
So, is there anything else you think potential readers need to know about The Dark Mirror or The Bone Season series?
The series has a learning curve, like most fantasy, but Paige will help you get to grips with the worldbuilding. You don’t need to memorize all the voyant types, for example. If one of them becomes important, Paige will make sure you understand it when it crops up. She also has a sense of humor, which I hope will prevent the dystopian elements of the series from becoming too overwhelming.
Finally, if someone enjoys The Dark Mirror, and they’ve read the other books in The Bone Season series, what fantasy novel or novella by another author would you suggest they check out while waiting for book 6 to come out?
I’d recommend Kate Dylan. Her books Mindwalker and Until We Shatter both have elements that I think will appeal to Bone Season fans. The protagonist of Mindwalker has a similar gift to Paige, but it’s based on science rather than magic.
And do read Babel: An Arcane History by R. F. Kuang for a dark and compelling take on the University Of Oxford.
