She’s so guarded that the other students find her intensely unlikeable – but I found her combination of self-awareness, smarts, and black humour completely winning. She starts off as someone who, rejected by her peers, has decided to reject them right back, and as someone who spent most of school using that as a coping mechanism, I connected with her instantly. When the school offers her a new spell to learn, it’s usually lethal even if she asked for the most innocuous charm, but rather than diving headfirst into the darkest of magic and using her power to rule the school, she tries to keep herself on the straight and narrow. She’s a fascinating set of contradictions that makes her feel really unique – she has a true affinity for city-levelling, world-dominating evil, but steadfastly refuses to acknowledge it. When your own school is trying to eat you, and some privileged wannabe hero won’t stop saving your life, things can’t get much worse, right? Wrong. Amongst the Scholomance’s students is El, an extremely jaded young woman who just wants to survive to graduation without succumbing to her innate talent for evil, and who is plagued by the unwanted help of Orion, an adorkable cinnamon roll prone to heroics and not at all prone to noticing when someone really doesn’t want to be his friend. Picture a school whose corners are full of monsters ready to eat up tasty little magical kids – no teachers in sight, of course, so classes are self-taught and survival of the fittest is in full swing. That being said, I adored every single second of it, so if you have similar taste to me, you’re going to be on cloud nine! I’d compare it to early seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer – teen snark meets horrifying monsters via a little light romance – or possibly if someone handed black magic to all the characters of Heathers. It’s full of hugely detailed discussion of its own worldbuilding, and if you don’t immediately click with the main character, it’s probably not going to be your cup of tea. It’s a weird beast, somehow simultaneously slow and fast.

I should start with a disclaimer: I really don’t think this book is going to be for everyone. All opinions my own.Ĭontent warnings: Violence including murder, injuries, gore, many gross ways to die, and minor character death (none of this terribly graphic) black magic including using life force of others mentioned suicide mentioned in the abstract parental death mentioned. Ownership: E-ARC provided free of charge via NetGalley.

A deadly education reviews