I usually don’t touch fantasy novels set in schools because there are just so many derivative books flooding this little corner of the genre. But I was drawn to Emily Tesh’s amazing novel, The Incandescent, because its narrator is a teacher, rather than a student. This novel delivered someone I’ve craved for years now: a responsible adult taking charge rather than a scrapy pack of partially trained kids. This isn’t to say that our protagonist doesn’t make mistakes. She does. But she makes different, original mistakes. Also, I don’t have to suspend my disbelief that none of the adults on the scene have a clue what’s going on.
Dr. Saffy Walden1 is a very talented, very educated magician. The school where she works, Chetwood, has no idea how talented and knowledgeable she is because she is also so capable at serving as the school’s Director of Magic that everyone around her seems to forget that there could ever be a problem. She makes the school run like clockwork, and on a shrinking budget that would shock anyone who doesn’t work in education. She teaches. She counsels. She runs meetings. And she monitors the threat of demons that are drawn to the wild magic the school puts off like an interdimensional beacon.
When something does go wrong (because something will eventually go wrong with Walden’s highwire act, it comes a shock to everyone except Saffy. In the wake of a demonic attack that would’ve gone catastrophically wrong without the quick work of Walden and the school’s chief marshal—the very badass demon hunter Laura Kenning—saving the day, the school board sacks Laura and brings in a consultant. In another book, the amazingly written battle between Walden, Kenning, and the demon that has haunted the school for centuries would’ve been the end of the story. Here, it’s only the beginning. Walden knows that it’s only a matter of time before something bigger and badder turns up to replace the old threat. There always has to be an apex predator, after all.
Tesh kept surprising me with the plot of this book and I was delighted with every twist and turn. Unlike so many other school fantasy books out there, this book resists the worn tropes of the Big Bad, the side characters who are evil little shits for sake of having another antagonist to keep our hero(s) occupied during fight scenes, or conclusive showdowns followed by a happily ever after without anyone suffering serious injuries. I loved this book for its realism (even though there are some spectacular demons that show up in this book). I could feel how tired Saffy was with her never-ending grind. I sympathized with her as she constantly kicked herself for mistakes that she only could’ve seen with hindsight. And I very much admired her for refusing to give up her fight to keep her students safe.
The Incandescent is a deeply refreshing and satisfying read.
- British readers will get the joke referenced part way through the novel about Walden’s name. For readers outside the UK, Saffy is a common nickname for Saffron, and Saffron Walden is a very English town. ↩︎