Before V.E. Schwab started drafting "The Fragile Threads of Power," she knew exactly how it ended.
She writes her books backwards, starting at the ending, so she doesn't "stumble upon a new story idea." Everything is meticulously premeditated.
So when she determined how her hit fantasy series “Shades of Magic" would wrap in 2017, she knew there was a plot element that had to be dealt with. Either she could wrap it up, or leave a "tiny, little cracked window into the world" of the book.
"I decided to leave the window cracked," she tells TODAY.com.
Now, Schwab, known for her beloved BookTok hit novel "The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue," is now opening that window wide open and diving back into the world of the four parallel Londons through her new series "The Fragile Threads of Power." The book dives back into an 1800s-era multiverse made up of multiple Londons, where only magicians known as the Antari can travel between the worlds.
Set several years after the events of "A Conjuring of Light," the book brings back her "core quartet" of fan-favorite characters, namely Kell, Lila, Alucard and Rhy.
"My characters were in their early 20s, and now they’re like 30," she says.
She also introduces a brand new batch of characters — including the new queen of one of the Londons and a girl with the ability to exert power over all the parallel worlds — with Schwab taking on a new challenge for herself: "Can I write characters that the reader won't be able to tell if they're heroes or villains until the end?"
Schwab discussed the new series as well as her other projects — including the anticipated film adaptations of "The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue" and "Shades of Magic" — in conversation with TODAY.com.
This interview was edited and condensed for clarity.
How long have you been planning 'The Fragile Threads of Power'?
It all started because of this tiny little thread. (It's) a favor that one of the character, Lila Bard, is on the hook for and doesn't get to call in. So then of course, my brain just started wondering, well, what's the favor, and what does it mean? I knew I wanted to do a time gap, and I knew I wanted it to feel like a brand new trilogy.
Then the question is like how can you make (the book) bigger, or better, or stranger, or stretch in a new direction. So that's what took probably the next three to four years.
What do you caution readers to expect going into this time jump?
My goal as a writer is to design characters that feel like they continue to live when you're not reading them. I don't want my character's existence to ever feel contingent on the reader's attention. So this was the goal for me: Can I come back? Have seven years pass, and have you as the reader believe that these characters lived seven years, every day, not just when you were looking at them.
We write novels, and then when the novel is done, it becomes static, it becomes unchangeable. But we as creators continue to grow. And one of the hardest things about returning to a world is that I'm a different version of myself. I wrote the opening lines of "A Darker Shade of Magic" in 2013 and 14. I was 25, and I'm now 36. It's been almost exactly 10 years. And so you grow a lot as a human being.
One of the fears that I had was, if I returned to the world will I feel like I am doing an impersonation of a previous version of myself in the writing? Something that this time leap gave me was the ability for my characters to grow, too.
How present is core quartet from 'Shades of Magic' in the new book?
I don't like it when there's cameos. I don't like it when you're promised your beloved characters, and then they're there for a page. The core quartet take up about 60% of the book, 60 to 70%. So we're easing readers in. Probably this book, "Fragile Threads," is the most you will have of the original cast, because I feel like what we're also doing in this book is telling you what went down in the last seven years.
I predict that the amount of space on page that the core quartet will take up will go down slightly as we ease readers into the new quartet.
The excitement's in the collision. How is Kell, an OG character, going to collide with Tes, our new protagonist? How is Kosika, the new queen of White London, going to find her way into Red London? I remember when I wrote the scene where Lila Bard meets Tes for the first time, we set them up on these like parallel journeys, that then just crash into each other. The new and the old meeting is my favorite part.
It’s not a passing of the torch; it's threads tangling.
This trilogy is set up a little differently, too. Each book has a new lead character taking point. In this book, Tes, who is one of our new characters, is really like the point person — Tes and Kosika. But in the next book, it's two other people, who were minor, minor people in "Fragile Threads."
Is it crucial to read 'Shades of Magic' before 'The Fragile Threads of Power'?
Officially, no. If I've done my job properly, no. It is designed as an entry point for new readers.
Having said that, do I think that reading "Shades of Magic" will heighten the experience even further? Yes.
Ninety percent of the story will land on you and will permeate you if you have not read "Shades." But there are some inside jokes. There's one character in particular whose legacy from the first trilogy into the new trilogy is very important.
How many film and TV projects are you working on right now?
In the days before the strike, I turned in the first draft of the film adaptation for “A Darker Shade of Magic, and the “Addie LaRue” script was being revised and well on its way to casting. Everything was going well.
So you wrote the script for 'Shades of Magic'?
I wasn't the first writer. This is the beautiful thing about about TV and film, right? It was in development at Sony, it still is at Sony, it was in development for five years. It went through multiple screenwriters, but I didn't have the clout at the time. Then I got some experience under my belt.
We have very talented writers, but "Shades of Magic" can be an arduous task. It's a very large series. It's a very large world, and it can be really difficult to balance the world building and the story and the character. And at the end of the day, I'm really glad that the task came back to me because I feel like very few people in this world are as literate when it comes to this series as I am. And also weirdly, as capable of making changes. I know how to make changes to story that still maintain the center of the character.
I have enough experience with having adaptations go poorly, and fall apart along the journey with characters simply being lost and ending up as just plot shell. I have become really precious, really protective of the characters in recent years.
Have you ever considered writing a sequel to 'The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue'?
I write from the ending backwards. So when I'm writing something, I know whether it's a standalone or a series. I just, I know it from go because if it were a series, I would structure it differently.
The endings are contentious, but the ending is also what as an author I choose. I make everything backwards from there. So when I decide on an ending, it's not a thing I do lightly. I specifically choose the moment of departure, and I always caution readers to think of it like, the story doesn't stop — it's a party you're no longer invited to. You have to go home.
The difference between a successful standalone and an unsuccessful one, is that if you succeeded, the reader should want more. But they shouldn't need more. If they need more to understand the story — it's not a successful standalone. If they want more because they want the story to go on — it's a successful standalone.
So I love that there is clamor for more. But also our favorite things are the things we are given in extreme moderation. And sometimes when we're given too much of something that we like, it loses its potency.
If we're given too much, and we wish they should have ended sooner, I don't ever want to have that relationship. It's one of the biggest hesitations I had for "Threads." We got to be doing something brand new here so that people aren't like, "Oh, it was an unnecessary continuation."
