Written by Clancey Cheeley
Young Adult literature can often fall victim to overused tropes; love triangles, post apocalypses, star-crossed love, these are staples of the genre and can cause many YA books to feel formulaic. This is not the case with Kiersten White’s historical fiction YA novel And I Darken. Wr57
/0itten in 2016, the story depicts the early life and rise of Vlad Dracul also known as Vlad the Impaler, who would go on to become the inspiration for Dracula. White’s novel takes creative license with one element of history however, Vlad is now Lada, a girl growing up in what would become modern day Romania. The book follows Lada and her younger brother Radu from their lives as part of the brutal Wallachian nobility, to their ransom as political prisoners in the Ottoman Empire. Using violence, cunning, and their unlikely friendship with the son of the Sultan, the siblings must try to survive and thrive in order to make lives for themselves and return home.
Despite being a YA novel, And I Darken never reads like one. The most apt comparison would be George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series, but perhaps comparisons to Game of Thrones are overused these days… And I Darken is rife with political intrigue and war, but what makes the narrative shine is its characters. The youngest of the two siblings is Radu, a kind, clever, and sensitive boy who learns to love his new Ottoman home. Radu’s personality stands in stark contrast to his older sister Lada who is aggressive, violent, and borderline feral. Lada is unlike any female character I have encountered in fiction; she is unapologetically cruel and brutal, but always charismatic and impossible to root against. Lada’s decisions were sometimes hard to stomach, but they were always relatable. Radu on the other hand became more and more unsympathetic as the narrative went on, his jealousy and selfishness clouding his actions and leading him to make decisions that could easily turn the reader against him. The believability of the two siblings and their unwavering loyalty (and occasional jealousy) towards each other is the heart of the book and watching their polar-opposite personalities clash is one of its strongest elements.
Kiersten White cleverly weaves real historical figures and events into a compelling story that never falls into monotony. And I Darken begins a dramatic series and I for one, cannot wait to see Lada fully realize her bloody legacy as one of the most powerful, intelligent, and vicious rulers in history.
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