The Children by Melissa Albert review Melissa Albert’s first adult novel, ‘The Children,’ explores the destructive impact of a famous children’s author, Edith, fictionalizing her children’s lives into her popular ‘Ninth City’ series. The narrative follows Guinevere Sharpe, Edith’s daughter, as she navigates her mother’s literary legacy and the dark truths surrounding her childhood, her brother Ennis, and the mysterious circumstances of her parents’ deaths. The novel intertwines past and present, revealing secrets about the creative process, family trauma, and the uncanny nature of their childhood home.

• Melissa Albert’s debut adult novel, ‘The Children,’ examines the dark side of writers who fictionalize their children’s lives.
• The protagonist, Guinevere Sharpe, is the daughter of Edith, a renowned children’s author whose ‘Ninth City’ series featured her children as characters.
• The novel contrasts Guinevere’s published memoir with the darker reality of her childhood, including her father Llewellyn’s decline and her parents’ toxic marriage.
• Guinevere’s relationship with her brother Ennis is strained, exacerbated by their parents’ deaths in a house fire and Ennis’s cryptic art.
• The book explores themes of the creative process, childhood trauma, and the blurred lines between fantasy and reality, drawing parallels to the ‘Ninth City’ series’ vampiric figure, the Architect.
• The review notes that the book’s numerous mysteries, while intriguing, may dissipate the story’s force, with some plot elements feeling rushed.