Deep Dark

🎶🎪🕵️🐙

by Zohra Nabi

★★★★

At a glance

Things I loved:

✍🏼 Author: Zohra Nabi

🎨 Cover artist: Paolo Escobar

📅 Release Date: 27th March 2025

📚 Book type: Chapter, 315 pages

🌟 Reader level: Confident

🕯️ Dark secrets hidden for centuries
🎪 Creepy, crime-filled fair setting
🎶 Ballad-sellers and musical storytelling
🕵️ Twisting mystery of missing children
⚠️ Dangerous adventures and kidnappings
🐉 Fearsome underground beast lurking

Dive Deeper

My Thoughts...

I picked up The Deep Dark at the Bovey Tracey Book Festival because the cover is absolutely gorgeous and the blurb immediately grabbed me—pickpockets surviving on the streets of London? Yes please!

The story follows Cassia Thorne, a girl growing up inside the Fleet prison with her father, dreaming of a different life. She earns money selling ballads at Bartholomew Fair, but when children begin to go missing, she teams up with Felix and Teo to uncover the truth. What they discover is far darker than they expected… with a mysterious beast lurking beneath the streets of London.

The setting is one of the book’s biggest strengths. From prisons and workhouses to lively (and slightly dangerous!) fairs, the historical London backdrop feels rich and exciting. The story is packed with deep, dark secrets that have been hidden for hundreds of years by those in power, along with eerie secret meetings, dangerous adventures, kidnappings, and a truly fearsome beast I definitely wouldn’t want to meet! I also loved learning about the real-life ballad sellers and how cleverly this links to Cassia’s musical talents.

There are lots of interesting characters and intertwining storylines, which makes the plot feel complex and cleverly put together. The ending definitely left me wanting more—while I would have liked a few more answers, it has set things up nicely for the next adventure.

🌟I’d recommend this to confident readers who enjoy darker mysteries, multiple points of view, and stories where secrets slowly unravel in surprising (and sometimes chilling!) ways.🌟

Blurb

Cassia Thorne leads a double life. By day, she sells ballads at Bartholomew Fair. By night she spends her evenings locked up in Fleet Prison. Cassia has plans of escaping both of these lives. But this year there are rumours of children being snatched off of the streets of London and no one willing to help.

So Cassia decides to take matters into her own hands; with the help of a young pickpocket, Teo and her friend Felix, Cassia starts to investigate the disappearances. She soon discovers a sinister conspiracy at the heart of the city - mysterious men in blue coats and whispers of a beast that lives in the deep dark tunnels below the city. Can Cassia get to the bottom of the mystery and rescue the missing children before it's too late?

Join Cassia and her friends on a spine-tingling supernatural adventure through the streets of London!

Map

Should I read this book?

You should read this book if you...

🕰️love stories set in historical London🕰️

🩸don't mind kidnap, violence and supernatural beasts!🩸

🕵️like complex stories with lots of characters and storylines🕵️

Reader level: Confident

Content: 9+

Help me to read

Ballads:
Songs or poems that tell a story, often sung aloud.
Bartholomew Fair:
A huge, busy fair in old London with stalls, shows, food and crowds of people.
Workhouse:
A place where very poor people lived and worked in tough conditions in return for food and shelter.
The Fleet:
A famous old prison in London where people were kept, often because they owed money.
Conspiracy:
A secret plan made by a group of people, usually to do something wrong.
Latin:
An ancient language from Rome that is not spoken anymore but is still used in some words today.
Patterer:
Someone who sells things by calling out loudly to attract customers, often in the streets