I can’t quite remember who recommended this so if you’re reading this, thank you!! While The Maker of Swans was somewhat frustrating in its lack of information about the magic system, I still enjoyed this well-written tale very much.

The Maker of Swans is a strange book. There are words, beautifully written words, and a type of magic system based on words. How the magic works, however, I can’t really tell you. I know that Clara, our protagonist, is considered to be gifted. Why or how gifted, however, I can’t tell you.

What I can tell you is that Clara can’t speak. But although she can’t form words with her mouth, her head is full of them – she can reproduce passages from almost any book perfectly and she writes the most enchanting passages for Eustace, the butler and person she is closest to, to find. Her actual guardian, Mr Crowe, is rather absent but she prefers it that way.

Sadly, everything changes one night when Mr Crowe brings home a young woman, Arabella, and possibly shoots a young man to death. We’re not too sure, the book tells us he’s dead, but not by the guns fired. Eustace, keenly aware of the consequences, immediately takes action to protect Crowe and Clara.

Honestly, I think I should be more frustrated with the book, but I’m not. I should be frustrated at how little information we’re given, at how little we know about the world by the end, but I was caught up in the drama of the moment. Even if I didn’t know why, I felt Eustace’s urgency and panic as he made plans to protect the people in his family. I felt Clara’s confusion as her world was upturned and then taken away. And on the strength of these two characters, I was carried to the end of the book.

So there you have it: The Maker of Swans is a paradox. I’ll probably end up rating it fairly highly on Goodreads because despite the lack of information, I really enjoyed the book. For me, the prose and atmosphere, together with the characters, helped to overcome the lack of information regarding the magical setting. If you’re a reader that needs a concrete magic system and a bit more of a plot (I still don’t know why Eustace was so panicked and what Crowe actually did while trying to get Clara back), you may want to avoid this, but if you’d like to just float on words and characters, you might want to read this.