Postcrossing Blog

I’ve been eager to tell you all about A Letter to the Luminous Deep, a debut novel by Sylvie Cathrall. It’s a fantasy novel (or maybe a little bit sci-fi), and it’s told entirely through the medium of letters sent between the characters. From the start, it’s clear that some disaster has befallen, and piece by piece the letters start filling in the blanks.

The whole story is so full of love and tenderness of all kinds. From the start, we know that two of the main characters, E. and Henery, are gone. E.'s sister, Sophy, and Henery’s brother, Vyerin, are trying to gain some closure and understanding of what happened by pooling together the letters each of them has from their siblings’ personal effects. Almost all the story is told through these letters, though sometimes other bits and pieces are included to give extra context and flesh out the world. The letters between E. and Henery slowly evolve from acquaintanceship to a close friendship, even love, which is a delight to read—and in parallel, Sophy and Vyerin come to understand and mourn their siblings, and also form a friendship of their own with each other.

It probably sounds from that like the whole story is sad, and there is definitely a deep sadness to it, as Vyerin and Sophy grieve and try to come to terms with loss. There’s also a cosiness, though, as we follow E. and Henery’s budding relationship—and there’s a fair bit of intrigue, as well, as all of the letters come together to show that there’s some kind of mystery, something very strange going on. I finished the book feeling enchanted, excited, and eager for the next installment: I won’t give away any spoilers, but the climax of the book reveals even more mysteries, and leaves Sophy and Vyerin feeling pretty hopeful and excited about what’s to come. It doesn’t end on a downer, for sure!

I have two caveats in recommending this book: one, it’s written in a sort of faux-Regency, partially formal style that a lot of readers seem to have struggled with, and two, sometimes the epistolary format doesn’t quite work. For example, to show us Henery and E.'s first meeting, a random piece of paper is included on which they wrote down their conversation; this sort of makes sense because we’re told it was very loud in the room they were in, but it still comes across as a bit stiff and contrived.

That said, I personally didn’t mind the style at all, and overall adored the book. I have no idea how Cathrall will pull off the second book (maybe it won’t be epistolary as well?), but either way I’m very excited for it, and eager to get my hands on it. I have so many questions, and I very much enjoyed the time spent getting to know Sophy, Vyerin, Henery and E. If you give it a shot, I hope you love it too!

Next time I write a book review, I really should cover Lynne M. Kolze’s Please Write, but I’m always eager to hear about more books about letters, postcards and the mail. You can let me know about books you think would be a good fit in the forum topic I made for that. (To view and post there, you may need to log in and spend some time browsing and participating in the forum first!)