Series Rec: The Shadow Players Trilogy
Thank you so much to the team at SparkPoint and Greenwillow Books for sending me books 2 and 3 for this series review!
Today I’m bringing you a recommendation for a young adult fantasy trilogy that I really love. It’s the Shadow Players trilogy by Heidi Heilig. The final book (On This Unworthy Scaffold) is out NOW! It just released yesterday!! So it’s a perfect time to read this series – you can read all three at once hehe.
First of all, we obviously have to appreciate these covers because WOWOWOWOW. The cover artwork for each book is done by Leo Nickolls and oh man. I really could stare at these all day. I LOVE the colors, and the slightly dark and ominous feeling that the covers give. It works really well with the title of the series, and the kind of magic in the books. Like seriously I kind of wish I had more shelf space so I could turn these to face outward on the shelf haha.
I reread the first book in preparation for the final book – since I first read it in 2018! I then proceeded to read the second and third books right in a row, because I HAD TO KNOW WHAT WOULD HAPPEN. Isn’t it such a great feeling when a book does that to you? Because of that, this series review is probably going to be just a mix of thoughts about the series as a whole, rather than really breaking down each book. I’ll do this by highlighting themes/things that run through the whole series that I loved! And of course, I will refrain from mentioning spoilers for the two sequels.
Writing Style/Format
Most of these books are told in a classic novel format, but scattered throughout them are different pieces of ephemera. This includes sheet music, handwritten letters, propaganda posters, show bills, and etc. I thought this was super cool to include, and adds a really fun element to the story. I believe someone has even recorded the music included in the books! Also, most of the story is told from Jetta’s point of view, in first person. However, there are occasional scenes that are told in the third person point of view and the are presented as a play/show script. This is probably my favorite way I’ve read of doing different perspectives. Since each book is divided into “acts,” it feels natural to have this play aspect included in the novel. I feel like this style makes the perspective switch very smooth, and it works really well.
Mental Health/Illness Rep
I can count on one hand the amount of times I’ve seen bipolar disorder represented in fantasy. It’s one time. It’s this series haha. Jetta, our main character, has what she describes as a “malheur,” but is what we in the physical world would call bipolar disorder. I can’t speak to the rep as I don’t have it, but the author does and drew a lot on her own experiences in writing this story. I do have anxiety and depression though, so seeing any sort of mental health/illness rep in fantasy is really amazing to me. It is wonderful to see it as something that has been historically looked down upon, but is shown to be nothing that should be stigmatized.
Great Cast of Characters!
Though Jetta is our main character, we really follow a larger cast of characters. There are Jetta’s parents, two showgirls, a mysterious smuggler, the enemy general and his sister, the rebel leader, and others who I probably shouldn’t mention! Hahaha. I was also purposefully vague in the descriptions of the characters, sorry!! Guess you’ll just have to read the book to meet them and find out more hehe. Each person is much more than the simple descriptor I used. I really liked getting to know them all over the course of the three books. We get to see all different kinds of relationships between them all! The author also includes a wonderfully diverse cast, queer characters, disabled characters, trans characters, people of different races, and etc. It is all done so well and so naturally – AS IT SHOULD BE.
Family Relationships
I mentioned that Jetta’s parents are some of the characters we get to meet, and it is great to see how her relationship with her parents changes and grows as a result of everything going on. There are also found family relationships, between the showgirls and the smuggler (Leo, Cheeky, Tia). And of course, the found family grows as the characters meet each other and learn to trust one another. We also get to see complicated sibling relationships, between Leo (the smuggler) and (oops spoiler!). I just love books that include family dynamics!!!
Magic and World Building
Okay I guess this is a bit morbid of me, but I really like seeing necromancy in books haha. Maybe because the books I’ve read that feature it all have some interesting aspect to it that makes it really interesting? ANYWAY. The key magic in this series deals with necromancy, and the ability to entrap the souls of the dead. Obviously this raises ethical problems (or maybe not obvious for one of the villains). I like that we get to see Jetta dealing with the downsides to her magic – as we know, most magic usually comes with a price. It was also very neat to see how the same magic can work and be used by different people. Another aspect of the world building is the setting. Most of the series takes place in Chakrana, which is inspired by countries in the South East Asia region. The colonizers are from a place called Aquitan, which is a pretty obvious analogy for France. The descriptions of both places definitely made me want to visit!!
Colonialism and Racism
As I mentioned, we have a group of people that have colonized and taken over the main country of Chakrana. The did so under the guise of “saving” the country from themselves. Naturally, this brings a lot of issues with colonialism and racism into play. I think the author handles writing about this really well, and is very sensitive in the treatment of the topic. I think that though this is not an enjoyable topic, it’s an important one, and important for people to read and learn about. Maybe through fiction, people can start the work in realizing modern day/real world problems.
So in summary: go treat yourself and get copies of these three books!! I only mentioned things I liked, as the things I didn’t like were minor – no books are perfect. Overall, this is a GREAT trilogy and one that I think everyone should know about!!! And I am absolutely looking forward to whatever Heidi’s next project is!
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