I was very excited to read my first ever Naomi Novik book. Thank you very much to PRH International for the eARC.
Though life was a little hectic, I wanted and managed to read a few pages every day, or more when the story was getting really intense.
There are many aspects I loved, from the appearance of the familiars at the end, to the exciting yet painful maintenance scene! I enjoyed reading about El's background and reason for adversity, was very glad when she managed to find people she could trust and call friends. Her relationship with Orion was naturally developed and the last line blew me away! I am looking forward to the second book! This was definitely an "I-need-the-sequel-right-now" book for me.
P.S. A longer review to come on my bookstagram and Goodreads accounts

4/5 stars

I truly enjoyed this weird kind of anti-YA fantasy novel. But I don't think this book will be everybody's cup of tea.

Regarding the racist passages some people have addressed, I've read reviews and various threads on Twitter and I have to say that most arguments seem forced to me. However, I agree that the author could've avoided using the word "dreadlocks". Maybe the info on Indian culture was not as accurate as it should've been, but the novel is coherent, so everything makes perfect sense within the narrative to me. I really don't see how this book could be considered racist whatsoever.

A Deadly Education criticises societies that are based on selfish individuals who'd do whatever it takes to survive. Every single day inside of the Scholomance can be your last and most of the times you pretend to be friendly to others just because you need something. All the characters mind their own business and believe me: these are terrifically imperfect characters. Both El and Orion are annoying some times, and yet you end up caring for them. They are cold and serious, but also generous and comic. Don't expect to find badass heroes or heroines in this book because... Well, there aren't. As I said, they basically do what they think is best to live another day.

In fact, the word "absurd" as in "this cannot be true", crossed my mind several times while reading this book; not because of the plot, but because of its underlying ironic tone. El is super powerful, but she often needs to be saved because if she used her powers, she would kill all the monsters plus the rest of the students. Orion is the naïve knight in shining armour who desperately tries to save everybody, the one all the students adore, but in reality they just want him to serve as the monsters' happy-willing meal. Ironic. Surrealist. Absurd. You get what I mean?

On another note, this is a very dense book, with lots of "info dumps", since the worldbuilding is complex and shady as you have no idea. I personally loved it, but I'm sure many readers won't. It kind of reminded me of Kristoff's Nevernight, but better. What can I say: I love Naomi Novik.

The ending was not epic, true, but it sure leaves you on a cliffhanger. I need more. I'm so excited to see where this story goes!

This was my first Naomi Novik novel, and it was phenomenal! I look forward to the next in the series.

I am a huge fan of Naomi Novik's previous work so I jumped at the chance to read this book. This story involves a magical school unlike any other. It exists in a void, has no staff, and oh by the way-is chock full of mals who roam the school snacking on the student population. Students come here at the age of 14 and try to survive until age 18, where they run the mal gauntlet at their graduation ceremony and *if* they make it out alive might be lucky enough to become a member of an enclave, a much coveted position. Much covted to everyone except our protagonist Galadriel "El". El is a loner with an affinity for destruction on a massive scale. Other characters include Orion Lake who is some sort of mal killer extraordinaire. The world built here is fantastic, even if it seems you're kind of thrown into it at the beginning. The school is populated by many characters from all over the globe and the politics and jockeying for position is savage. It took me til about halfway through the book to get a sense of the school and characters but I am glad I stuck with it as I really did end up enjoying it. Also there is a bit of a cliffhanger that makes me very intrigued for the next book. People who liked the Magicians or Catherine House will probably like this. People who are expecting stories like previous Novik outings (Spinning Silver/Uprooted) might be a little disappointed

Thanks to NetGalley and Del Ray Books for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

4+ stars

High school is normally hard but at Scholomance the school is actually trying to kill you. Scholomance is a deadly boarding school for magic with no adults and nasty creatures trying to eat all the students. You have to survive four years while learning spells and even then you have small odds that you will make it.

I really liked the main character El. She has the potential to become a powerful evil witch but she works hard to control those impulses. She is an outsider and loner in a world where you need others to watch your back. El learns to open up and find her way at the school. I thought there was great world building describing the wild school. I am looking forward to book two in the series.

The Scholomance is a school like no other. There are no teachers. There are no vacations. There are no friendships. There are only magical students, locked up to learn to protect themselves against a world that wants to devour their powerful essences. And El is the most deadly of them all—except she can't prove it unless she wants to destroy herself and murder the rest of her classmates and fulfill her prophecy of death and destruction. Until the hero of her year, Orion Lake, swoops in to save her not once, not twice, but three times! El will not abide.

I really, truly enjoyed this book!

I loved El, the snarky, antisocial heroine who is very much a product of her times. Her mother is the most amazingest white witch on the planet, and her father died getting them (her mother was pregnant at the time of graduation) out of Scholomance. She has been rejected by the Indian side of her family, who saw death and destruction within her, and has been ostracized and terrorized her entire life thanks to her powerful latent magic.

The side characters weren't as powerfully drawn as I would have liked, but I did enjoy how they were all products of their environment and the circumstances that being a wizard meant in this weird world where demons are everywhere.

They wanted comfort, then they wanted luxury, and then they wanted excess, and ever step of the way they still wanted to be safe, even as they made themselves more and more of a tempting target, and the only way they could stay safe was to have enough power to keep off everyone that wanted what they had.

The privilege of those who were in the enclaves versus everyone else, and the compound wealth of having things passed down from student to student within the school and the sharing of magic, was very well done. There were so many parallels to the inequalities of now within Scholomance, and how the enclave students saw their privilege and didn't care because it allowed them a better chance at survival in this cruel, cruel world. It meant that the non-enclave kids had to be meaner, smarter and more ruthless in order to survive in a world destined to have them be demon food for the rich.

The most ridiculous character, then, in this world where everyone was little stabbing each other in the backs for a little something nicer, was Orion Lake. The scion of wealth, power and privilege and utterly unaware of just how good he had it and how he too was being exploited.

I enjoyed his not-a-relationship with El, and how El was just like, ugh fine yes let's everyone think we're dating so I can get some street cred but not like pity-cred but omg no Orion can't find out we're fake-dating because then my plan is ruined!

The downside to this book was that the info dumps hit, and they hit hard. That is the problem with writing an introspective, antisocial character. Everything is in their head, and El is so smart and so isolated that it's not like she has friends she can talk to. Plus, she's so smart that she's thinking in a bajillion different angles every second even when awful, horrible things are happening and because she's terrified that she will turn back and accidentally use life-force magic instead of white magic and fulfill the prophecy.

However, while I understood the exposition, there was...a lot of it. And I enjoyed El's voice, but sometimes the snark and sarcasm were a little overwhelming and I kept thinking stop fucking THINKING and get a move on with the action, kid!

BUT. There is a shit ton of action and a lot of creepy shit, even if sometimes it felt like it was creepy for the ~aesthetic~ of dark academia meets demons. The demons were all creepy as fuck, however, which made it all the more believable that everyone was as locked into survival mode as they were. Generations of this hell meant everyone was a rat bastard.

And the ending. What a cliffhanger!

Holy exposition it cannot end like this! I need book 2 in my life right now.

I received this ARC from NetGalley for an honest review.

A really fun, compelling novel that is sure to appeal to fans of Harry Potter! The world building was fantastic and I loved the main character.

I was a bit disappointed, the plot seemed boring and uninteresting. For me, the characters seemed flat, I didn't like them at 100% and I found the main character annoying. While the atmosphere of the academy was great, it didn't meet my expectations, I may read the next book but it's not that I'm dying to read the sequel.

Naomi Novik has written a classic fantasy in A Deadly Education. The Scholomance is a survival school for magic students. Galadriel is a sorceress with an affinity for maleficent magic; she is in a difficult relationship with Orion who is super popular. The novel is told from her point of view; many students will perish in the school year and she wants to survive without using her mal talents. Dip in and enjoy this first chapter on Scholomance.

I have had Naomi Novik titles on my TBR for years and have never gotten around to reading them. When I saw this title come up to request, I thought I would give it a try! I really loved the idea of the story. This book follows El, a student at the Scholomance, a magical school hell bent on killing all the students. The likelihood of getting out alive is slim, especially if you are alone with no one to watch your back. That's where El is when the book starts out, but as the plot moves on it becomes apparent she will need some friends if she wants to have a fighting chance.

I did struggle with the pacing of the story, and the format I think. There was a lot of inner monologue, and I found myself going back and forth a lot because the sort of rambling inner thoughts had gotten away from the plot and by the time it came back to the present I had lost the thread of what was going on. I did enjoy the story, and I liked El, as well as a lot of the supporting characters. I think a map would have been helpful, although I know there was one on the endpapers of the physical book. Overall I enjoyed the story and I am excited to read the next one!

I was given an advanced reader's copy via NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own

Thank you Random House and Netgalley for gifting me this copy.

This has been one of my most anticipated books of the year so I was definitely excited to read it! If you think this is going to be like any other magic school think again.

The world of the Scholomance is similar to our world except for the existence of murderous monsters and unfortunately our lead Galadriel is a super magnet for them. Our story takes place entirely within the walls of the school where the students are locked in and constantly under attack. This brings in one of the main themes of the book of class and privilege as enclaves are formed for protection. Much of your time at school is either trying to get into or protect your enclave group. These are most often formed according to geography and of course who you know. I found this aspect fascinating and heartbreaking, much like the unfairness of real world systems that protect the powerful instead of the needy.

As for our characters our 1st person narrative of Galadriel (or El for short) is filled with observations she makes of her classmates and the unfairness of the system as she is a constant loner. She is smart and witty but also grouchy and angry with the world. As someone who loves these kinds of characters (like Nesta in ACOTAR) I quite liked her. She reminded me of Gideon in Gideon the Ninth. I found her arc in this book wonderful as she finally starts to open up and find people who will accept her.

I liked the side characters too and disagree with others who have said they have no substance. We meet a boy who shows us kindness and selflessness but also how that is tearing him apart. Other characters show how dark humanity can get when it comes to survival and how hard making true friends versus allies can be. I feel with this being the 1st book of a series their stories will be even further fleshed out as is the case with other series.

Overall I really enjoyed this story. I found it intriguing and unpredictable. The main negative for me was indeed the many info dumps which seem to take up much of the 1st half of the book. Once I got to the halfway mark the story started to flow better and have actual progress. I expect that to improve in the next book since this one was mainly the introduction. I will be eagerly awaiting it's release.

Finally addressing the controversy since it's release. If you read this book and were hurt by it those feelings are valid. My review is not trying to take that away. However I will argue that I found much of the complaints not as bad as I've seen portrayed. That being said we all rate books different based on our expectations and experiences, what I like might not be what you like. In this case what I find offensive might not be what you might. We all come into these books with things that will trigger us differently. I agree I did not like the locs passage as it felt unnecessary to single out them in that way. She made an apology for that and other complaints and has said she will try to do better. I accept that as it seemed to me she was truly trying to make this a diverse world. I won't fault her for trying and as this is a fantasy I don't expect her to explain real world conflicts or understand every single culture's nuances. I would rather her try than keep all the characters white and I don't think she shoved other cultures in for sales as I've seen people accuse her of. If you've ever seen her speak she always advocates for more diversity on page and in publishing. In my opinion people should make up their own minds when it comes to books and as a POC even we come into reading from different backgrounds so feel free to disagree with me.

I don't know how Novik does it. She is one of the best storytellers of this generation for sure. I wasn't sure if I wanted to read such a dark take on a. magic boarding school, but the humor and snark of El carried me through the scariest parts. This novel takes places in a high school for wizards, where the likelihood of living through breakfast is low. Having an alliance of friends or belonging to a powerful enclave increases your chances. But El is too cranky and snarky to make friends. She is also one of the most powerful wizards of all time. And her fellow students are going to have to put their trust in her if they want to survive. I'm so glad that this is a first in a series. This is a world that I never want to leave.

Harry Potter, but if Hogwarts was actively trying to kill off all of its students.

This is a fun and mostly unique take on the magical boarding school sub-genre. It lacks the cozy comfort and noble good vs evil battle of Harry Potter and can’t match the eeriness and world building of something like the Gemma Doyle trilogy, but A Deadly Education mostly makes up for that with its humor and outstanding magical system.

It’s a different kind of book than most in its sub-genre. The way the school is structured is almost dystopian in a kill-or-be-killed way, but it maintains a light touch that is sorely absent from most dystopia.

The plot is a little disappointing. It’s tough to give meaning in this sub-genre when the students don’t really have an enemy. Sure, the school is trying to kill them (which is entertaining) and the enclaves are elitist (which is not), but without a tangible enemy, the good vs evil battle that we need to really get invested in a story like this is absent. I wonder if something like this will manifest later in the series. I hope so.

That aside, the book is mostly a good read anyway. Novik is still far better at writing humor than she is at writing action (as was the case in the Temeraire series), but the clever, unique workings of the magical system keep you invested even when the action sequences drag.

Galadriel (“El”) proves to be an intriguing and worthy heroine. What the magical system means for her specifically and how she reckons with that is one of the most interesting parts of the book.

The childish and insipid “I like you so I’m going to kick you and pull your hair” bickering between she and Orion gets tiresome and obnoxious, but her relationships with her friends and the other students are well drawn, sweet, and a little heartbreaking.

This book was amazing, I love the magic and the mechanics of how it works. I loved the horror of the school. I loved El.
Naomi Novik knows how to write fantasy. I found nothing missing or sup par in the book, She really is a master of the craft.
I have made a mistake because I need to know what happens and now I have to wait until June of 2021.

Deadly Education was a quick and delightful read. From the start it's clear that the Scholomance (a school for magical kids) is nothing like the wizarding schools in the fiction I grew up on. Here characters face mortal peril at every turn, and taking a shower or eating lunch can be a dangerous feat. El, the protagonist, is an unlikey hero in this tale, having been an outsider haunted by a dark prophecy her whole life. She's unlikeable and cynical from the very beginning, but is unafraid of speaking her mind and questioning the practices that favor the elite few and damn the rest of them. I'm excited to see where El's journey leads in the future of this series.

Absolutely excellent; I will be recommending this to everyone! Hilarious, inventive, diverse, delightful!

I was really looking forward to this book, but I have decided to not finish reading this book after discovering racist language.

I think it's well-written, but I did not enjoy the characters or the setting. I never got particularly invested in the story. It just wasn't for me, but I know we have library patrons who will want it due to the author's popularity.

The writing is really not working for me, the world-building is very info dumpey, and it just does not make a lot of sense. The world and the magic lack grounding for me and I just kept waiting for something to pull me into the story but it did not happen.

Thank you to Netgalley and Del Rey/PRH for the advanced copy of this book! I ended up buying a copy anyway because it was so gorgeous, but the advanced copy was a treat. (But seriously, the cover and art of this book is stunning. I highly encourage y’all to snag a copy of the physical book rather than the ebook, if at all possible.)

Naomi Novik is truly one of my favorite fantasy authors. Her works are startling and original, and her protagonists will stick with you long after you’ve finished the book. This new novel is no exception, though it’s remarkable different than Uprooted and Spinning Silver.

A Deadly Education follows El, a junior student at a deadly (duh), cutthroat school for magical children. The school is perilous, full of monsters that want nothing more than devour the magical children whole. El herself is just as dangerous—she has an affinity for destructive magic at apocalyptic levels. Although El tries to ignore her affinity, Scholomance is determined to give El as much deadly power as it can.

On the other side of this story is Orion Lake, the hero of the school, who has saved hundreds of lives from the monsters. After Orion saves El, the two form an uneasy alliance, though they’re as different as they can be. But Scholomance is growing deadlier by the second, and it’ll take a lot more than the two of them for their class to make it to graduation alive.

I think my mistake in this book was expecting it to be ANYTHING like Novik’s other works. I found myself waiting for El to be anything like Agnieszka from Uprooted, or for the plot to tend toward to fanciful and fairy tale-ish. She’s not, and it doesn’t. El as a protagonist is angry and rude and desperate to live. The environment of Scholomance is relentlessly creepy. The prose fluctuates between academic and casual and often runs through pages of angsty monologue without much dialogue or action. It is a GOOD book, but not at all what I was expecting. Still, despite my adjustment period, I found myself hooked and speeding through the last 100 pages to find out what happened.

I’m greatly looking forward to the next books in this series. I might reread this one again soon, bearing in mind what I know now. In a way, it’s really incredible that Naomi Novik can write such entirely different books, and be so damn good at it. 4/5 stars with a ton of excitement for book two!!