I had a dream where the end of the book was Ianthe and Beatrice married and about to do the dirty tango and the book ends with the author letting us know that the entire story was them just role-playing for foreplay. I woke up abruptly at the thought of my subconscious giving out spoilies. But then I came to the conclusion that that premise was far more interesting than what played out in the actual The Midnight Bargain.
The summary goes as follows (from Goodreads):
Beatrice Clayborn is a sorceress who practices magic in secret, terrified of the day she will be locked into a marital collar that will cut off her powers to protect her unborn children. She dreams of becoming a full-fledged Magus and pursuing magic as her calling as men do, but her family has staked everything to equip her for Bargaining Season, when young men and women of means descend upon the city to negotiate the best marriages. The Clayborns are in severe debt, and only she can save them, by securing an advantageous match before their creditors come calling.
In a stroke of luck, Beatrice finds a grimoire that contains the key to becoming a Magus, but before she can purchase it, a rival sorceress swindles the book right out of her hands. Beatrice summons a spirit to help her get it back, but her new ally exacts a price: Beatrice’s first kiss . . . with her adversary’s brother, the handsome, compassionate, and fabulously wealthy Ianthe Lavan.
The more Beatrice is entangled with the Lavan siblings, the harder her decision becomes: If she casts the spell to become a Magus, she will devastate her family and lose the only man to ever see her for who she is; but if she marries—even for love—she will sacrifice her magic, her identity, and her dreams. But how can she choose just one, knowing she will forever regret the path not taken?
Damn interesting, right? That's what I thought too.
There is a current intrigue that is going on with the dark academia aesthetic, so I quickly jumped on this novel because I wanted to live my best dark aesthetic life. The Midnight Bargain meets all the criteria for this to be an amazing dark, fantasy tale with velvet capes, regency attire, wispy locks of hair, and Latin exchanges. My high school self is crying because that could have been me if I didn't get a D in intermediate Latin. You can see why I really wanted to like this book. Alas, I was disappointed. And I think the main reason why is because I don't know if the author really knew what she herself was going for.
The book is marketed as fantasy romance which tells the reader that the setting, world, culture, etc. of the story will be influenced by the fantastical elements and the plot will be driven by the romance. At least that is typically what is to be understood when a book is marketed as fantasy romance. Either that, or I went into this book a complete idiot because that is not what happened.
For the record, I just want to say that Polk's writing is beautiful, and she takes time to really let the words paint the world she is creating, so it feels like we're enveloped in the world as much as the main characters are. So you can imagine my confusion when the story itself--in its inability to decide what it wants to be--becomes the subject of my confusion.
For one, the story tries so hard to convince us that Ianthe and Beatrice are these two individuals mad in love but kept separated by the story's chain of situations. But they rarely interact with each other. For the first half of the book, they've maybe hung out with each other three or four times. And even when they did, Ysbeta was always with them or one of them were dragged away by someone else (usually Ysbeta). Ysbeta and Beatrice were hanging out with each other so much that I thought my heteronormative societal conditioning was making assumptions and the real love interests were Ysbeta and Beatrice which frankly would have made for a far better story. They had way more chemistry than Beatrice and Ianthe. Whispering witch spells in dark rooms, walking in gardens, going on hunts for secret grimoires in vintage bookshops, spending away Sunday afternoons in Victorian libraries, it's a lesbian fantasy! Alas, it was clear that the love interests were meant to Ianthe and Beatrice which made for a disappointing love story but got me thinking.
Maybe the story isn't suppose to be romance.
Maybe the romance tag was a marketing ploy, and the romance was just meant to be secondary to the story. If that was the case, then the trajectory of the story makes more sense, and we could fault this all to just poor marketing. Problem solved, right? I wish.
Cause if that was the case, why insert the romance arc in there in the first place? And I say this as someone who loves romantic arcs. But the point of a romantic arc is to add another element to the story. Increase the stakes. But Polk makes little effort to develop Beatrice and Ianthe's chemistry and romance, so I don't care enough which makes the stakes a moot point. I would have just forgone the entire plot and just stuck to Beatrice learning to be a black market Mage. It would have been less distracting because with the romance, it felt like Polk was trying to do a balancing act only to fall on her ass and let both plots drop on her head like anvils.
It hurts to be so disappointed with this book because I wanted to like it so bad.
For one, I really liked Beatrice. Even if it did take me a while to warm up to her because it seemed like she was just an amalgamation of a lot of young adult tropes, but she deals with real issues in a real way. She struggles between the duty she has as a daughter, the desire she has as a magical prodigy, the loyalty she stands by as a friend, and infatuation she feels as a woman. Damn, what an icon. It took Polk a while to develop her as a character, which hindsight, I respect. Rather than forcing her down our throats, she gave us time to get to know her and like her. And just in time when we needed to like and empathize with her the most.
My favorite character though was Nadi, the spirit Beatrice carries in her body (in makes sense in the book). What I thought was going to be a minor character took the spotlight when she showed up. And before I knew it, her and her friendship with Beatrice meant the world to me. The kinship reminded me of the great duos literature has given us like Frodo And Sam from Lord Of The Rings, Mariam and Laila in A Thousand Splendid Suns, The March sisters from The Little Women (full disclosure, the moment I said it, I forget every single literary friendship and had to do a little bit of Googling. I'm a bibliophile, albeit a flawed one).
And the subject matter is so relative to today! Set in a regency-esque time and place and written in 2020, the readers are confronted with the memory of early suffragettes fighting, demanding to be seen as liberated individuals equal to men mixed with the reality of today in which the autonomy of a woman, specifically her right to make decisions about her own body and reproductivity, is still a discussion. We say we've made progress, but from where I see it, it's all a lie to sell us more shit to make us feel bad about ourselves. Tire us out enough that we are forced to abide by the regressive policies and attitudes.
In conclusion:
We deserved better. Hell, Polk deserved better.
I'm convinced the puzzle of a book is a product of publishers wanted one thing, and the author fighting for another.
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