A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik – Review #ADeadlyEducation

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

My rating: 5 of 5 Leaves

Release Date: 29th September 2020

Synopsis:

Lesson One of the Scholomance

Learning has never been this deadly

A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real) — until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets. There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won’t allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die! The rules are deceptively simple: Don’t walk the halls alone. And beware of the monsters who lurk everywhere. El is uniquely prepared for the school’s dangers. She may be without allies, but she possesses a dark power strong enough to level mountains and wipe out millions. It would be easy enough for El to defeat the monsters that prowl the school. The problem? Her powerful dark magic might also kill all the other students.

Review:

I’m going to start by saying that I had really high expectations for ‘A Deadly Education’, as I’ve adored the previous books I have read by Novik (Spinning Silver and Uprooted) and it definitely didn’t disappoint! I loved every minute of this book and am already itching for the second one. Having seen a lot of Harry Potter comparisons, I would say if that’s what you’re expecting, look elsewhere. The Scholomance is dark and dangerous, and the protagonist El is a lot more bitter, sarcastic and isn’t trying to be a hero. There’s a prophecy and a magic school, but that’s where it ends in my opinion!

‘A Deadly Education’ starts slowly, and requires you to pay attention, though that wasn’t an issue as I was drawn in from the first sentence. The worldbuilding was wonderful, and I was gripped by it, always wanting to learn the next new thing. I was so interested in both the Scholomance and also the ‘real’ world, the magic system and monsters. I don’t want to say too much, so that you can enjoy everything for the first time yourself, but I liked that the mals (monsters) are all disgusting and creepy, the mana system of magic and the workarounds for it’s abuse aren’t unique as such, but they are refreshing considering the amount of ‘innate magical power with no limits’ stuff I’ve read lately! There’s a lot of unsettling ideas in this book, and I love things being a little twisted and creepy, which at times this book definitely is. Saying that, there are a lot of moments where I laughed out loud, and there is a lot of wit, banter and humour mixed in with the shudder inducing mals.

Now onto the characters. Galadriel, better known as El, is brilliant, and I adored her. She’s kind of spiky, constantly on edge and full of anger and frustration. She’s a bit morally grey, which is my favourite kind of character. She could so easily turn to the dark side, but keeps trying to be a good person despite the effort that requires – and when your school keeps trying to kill you and is pushing you to be evil, that requires a lot of hard work. I liked her immediately but she may not be for everyone, and possibly requires a bit of warming up to. I’m a total sucker for a grumpy magic user though! I enjoyed watching her navigate relationships with other students, considering how much she’s an outcast. She’s always scheming (which is honestly necessary) which was interesting. She’s powerful, but not in a way she can be useful without blowing everything up. She was honestly so much fun to follow, and her snippy, sarcastic wit was an absolute joy. Next we have Orion, the golden boy of the Scholomance. He goes around saving other students (including El) and has a lot of fans, followers and general hangers-on. He’s too nice for his own good, a bit oblivious, exasperating and also loveable. I really enjoyed his character development, and all of his interations with El. He’s a lot more interesting than he appears at first, and I really enjoyed watching both he and El grow. There are a lot of excellent relationships to be found within the pages of this book, despite initial appearances, and I enjoyed that they all felt nuanced and realistic.

I really feel like I can’t say much more without spoiling anything but this book was absolutely brilliant, and I highly recommend it to fans of Novik’s other works, grumpy wizards, interesting magic systems, creepy monsters, magic schools, brilliant characters, excellent world building and fantastic writing. I’m counting down the days until book two already, I can’t wait to be back in the halls of the Scholomance and it’s definitely one of my top books of the year!