The sequel to A Deadly Education begins right where the first book left off, with Elle, Orion, and friends in their last year at Scholomance and newly determined to save as many students as they can. Elle becomes the focus of nearly all the monsters in the school now that she has used her powers to protect other students. With the help of her former rivals, she plans an escape from the deadly school for all of the students. The Last Graduate avoids some of the mistakes of the first book (accidental racism) but continues others (info dumps, uncomfortable romances, joltingly sudden changes and endings). One interesting thread from the first book, Orion's ability to produce manna by stealing it from monsters, gets some development, but this thread is cut off in service to a romance that rings false and feels shoehorned in to create symmetry. Fun but ultimately empty, The Last Graduate left me uninterested in a potential third book.

El has spent years pushing everyone away as she struggled to survive the brutal magical education meted out by the Scholomance. With the help of a few good friends and one annoyingly heroic semi-boyfriend, she learned to trust others and wield her terrifying abilities for good. This starts to give her all kinds of dangerously hopeful ideas about surviving graduation with her body and soul intact, maybe even getting her friends out. But the Scholomance has been eating young wizards for centuries, and it still has a few cruelties to dole out. El's grumpy quips keep things from getting too dark despite the eldritch nightmares.

This review is based on an eARC (Advance Reader Copy) provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The Last Graduate will be released on September 28, 2021. 

Naomi Novik’s A Deadly Education may not have been the best book I read last year, but the action-packed dark magic school novel was certainly one of the most fun, with a tantalizing ending that made The Last Graduate one of my most-anticipated sequels of 2021. And it absolutely lives up to expectations, bringing more of everything that made A Deadly Education great while expanding the scope and providing another excellent hook for book three. 

[Note: I will try to avoid significant spoilers for both A Deadly Education and The Last Graduate in this review.]

The Last Graduate begins in the same scene where A Deadly Education finished, as El and her class prepare to begin their final year at the Scholomance. This also represents the first influx of new students since the series began, and with them trickles in news of the outside world. Of course, anything from the outside world is bound to be forced onto the backburner as the students undertake another year of trying to survive random monster encounters and preparing for the large-scale survival battle that is graduation. But, even amidst the monsters and the teenage angst, The Last Graduate nevertheless begins to delve deeper into how the outside world affects what happens in the school, and how what happens in the school may affect the outside world. 

Honestly, it’s hard for me to imagine any fan of A Deadly Education not loving The Last Graduate. It includes and expands on everything that made the first book great. El learning how to relate to other people? Yep—she continues building the relationships that began in A Deadly Education and forges a host of new ones. Monsters behind every corner, and a big, climactic fight scene? Check and check. The distribution of threats has changed, but El still has plenty to fight, and the finale was enough to top the nail-biting closer from the first book. Exploration of inequality in magical society? Even deeper than in book one, as the influx of outside news begins to illustrate the rivalries between enclaves and their consequences, pushing beyond (although not putting aside) the rich kid/poor kid distinction from the first book. And The Last Graduate throws itself headlong at the problem of why parents would intentionally send their children to a murderous magic school—and, even worse, send them with the message that only the selfish survive—an issue that was addressed in the first book but still created some difficulty with suspension of disbelief. 

The Last Graduate is not without its flaws, but all of them were baked in from the beginning of the series, so anyone who was able to look past them in A Deadly Education will probably do so again here. There is a bit of a lull in the middle, but anyone who has read 300 pages of El’s meandering narration understands that the fight scenes will be seasoned with long digressions into backstory. It won’t be all action all the time, but El’s narrative voice is strong enough to carry the slow parts, just as it was in the first book. Similarly, the fairly monocultural magical world—with diversity mostly limited to obvious ethnic or linguistic markers—may be disappointing, but it’s hardly unexpected after seeing the same in A Deadly Education. And the enormously overpowered leads may feel a little over-the-top at times, but anyone who read about the exploits of Orion and El in the first book knows exactly what to expect in the sequel. 

On the whole, The Last Graduate doesn’t fix all of the flaws of the first book, but it keeps all of the fun, moves the relationships forward, and expands the scope, ultimately delivering a heart-pounding installment with a satisfying conclusion of its own and an excellent hook for yet another step forward in book three. 

Recommended if you like: magic schools, prickly protagonists learning how to live with other people, meandering first-person narration, lots of monster-fighting. 

Overall rating: 16 of Tar Vol’s 20. Four stars on Goodreads.

Oh, thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC but man oh man---how long until we get the next one?!?!?!?! I don't think I can wait until next year! That ENDING! What the heck! This was a great sequel, I was so involved the book practically read itself. I love El even more now. But I just do not know if I can handle this cliffhanger. I might need emotional support.

This book follows the same pattern as the first. The ramblings of our protagonist, the relationships she makes (or doesn't make), and the plan to save the world... maybe.
I flew through the first half of the book and had to slug through the middle, but was able blow through the end! I'm so glad Orion and El finally bucked up and processed their emotions, BUT I wanna know why El's Mom wanted her to stay away from Orion!

The Last Graduate is an engaging continuation of the Scholomance trilogy. Picking up where A Deadly Education ended, El and her friends must deal with the consequences of the first book and prepare for graduation. The students in The Last Graduate must use the rules of the school to find a way to break those rules in order to survive. The Last Graduate is an exciting and engaging read, and I am looking forward to seeing where the trilogy goes from here.

I am kind of mad that I read this before the third book is out because that ending!! I need more ASAP! It was great to be back with El, Orion and the rest of the crew.

The Last Graduate exceeded my expectations as A Deadly Education's sequel. Usually in the 2nd installment of a trilogy, authors stick with a lot of what made the first so good; think Catching Fire and how it was just a 'bigger and better' Hunger Games which prepared us for the real switch-up that came in the finale. I expected something similar here. I expected there to be the usual summer break I got used to when reading series like Harry Potter - a few month timeskip where the next book drops us right in the middle and we naturally learn about all that's changed for our characters. Instead, The Last Graduate puts the reader basically where the last book left off - right after the student's attempt to fix the cleansing machinery. Instead of a nice summer vacation to lick their wounds, we learn that in the scholomance there is no summer vacation, because of course, it's the scholomance. This sets the break neck speed for the rest of the novel.

The plot structure for this book seemed so clear, I expected there to be another buildup to a big battle at the end where all the characters we've come to love band together to exit the graduation hall. I expected Orion and Galadriel to finally hash out their feelings because they may never see each other again. I expected El to somehow use her powers to even the playing field with the enclavers and their privilege. The plot for this book could have written itself, and Naomi Novik tweaked things in a way I never anticipated, that I rejected at first, but came to love after giving it a chance. We still got everything I rifled off above, just in ways I didn't expect. To me that's one of skills that shows mastery of craft - giving the readers what they want in a way they didn't realize they could have it.

The Last Graduate is not what you'll expect, but I promise it delivers just as much as it's predecessor.

Thank you Naomi Novik, Random
House Publishing and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions are my own!

Wizards, monsters, a school with no teachers and a precariously high death rate. A prickly main character who kicks butt in equal measure. Let’s get into it.

Galadriel (El, for short) is a 17 year old witch in a dark and frightening world where young wizards escape into a magical school for both training and to avoid certain doom at the hands of hungry monsters. In the second installment in the Scholomance series, El has tied down a formidable alliance for graduation. She’s still in an adorably charming love-to-hate, will-they-won’t-they relationship with Orion Lake. But now… the rest of the students know that she’s a dangerous time bomb of a witch just waiting to go off. Even so, they might just need her to survive.

The first book in this series was my first ever read by Naomi Novik, and I struggled very similarly with her writing style during this one as I did in the first. Most of the narrative is El launching into a stream of consciousness, even while she is in the midst of a conversation. There are aspects of this that are really charming, namely that El is funny and relatable in her ramblings. However, it makes it entirely too easy to check out during world building, info dumpy streams, and the next thing you know, you’ve lost track of what’s going on. It’s also difficult to separate sometimes what is a story from the past and what is happening in the present. This style is just not something I’ve been able to get over, and it’s taken a lot away from it for me.

This being said, it was an interesting ride to follow along in El and her friends story for survival and a hopeful future after graduation. There’s lots of adventure, and undeniably delightful and laugh out loud funny conversations between our leading lady and her love interest. However, I also think it is important to address that the first book in this series caught a lot of heat for being racist, and rightfully so, as it was undeniably problematic and hurtful to many communities. While it is great that Novik responded to this and promised to remove various sections from printing going forward, she has not solved the problem of utilizing a diverse cast and multi-lingual speakers for brownie points rather than illustrating these characters and cultures meaningfully. I was disappointed by this to say the very least.

If you think you can get down with this writing style and the premise sounds interesting to you, you might pick up this series and like it. If you do, just definitely be mindful and think critically about the problems with the “diversity” attempts. If you suspect you might be like me, you’ll probably mainly enjoy the witty narratives and banter with the LI, and so you might skip it. At the end of the day, I’m giving this book 2.75/5 stars.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC!

I had just finished A Deadly Education (talk about a cliffhanger ending!) when I received this ARC to read. I was SO excited because timing couldn't be any better!

The Last Graduate picks up exactly where A Deadly Education left off. I liked that it did that, I felt like I didn't miss out on anything AND A Deadly Education ended on a cliffhanger so it was nice to pick right back up.

I found The Last Graduate just as entertaining and magical as the first book. It most definitely did not flop like some sequels have known to do. The writing was consistent and I've become a fan of Naomi Novik's work.

A brilliant and humorous sequel that lives up to the hype of the first book. The cliffhanger ending will leave you desperate for the next book in the Scholomance series. Noami Novik's character's are bright, synical. and witty, a delight to read and her magic school is no Hogwarts, but it's got the charm to blow other magic schools right into the void!

The Last Graduate continues right where A Deadly Education left off, and sees our characters through their senior year, through graduation.

If you enjoyed the first book, I'm quite sure you will enjoy this one too, and in equal measure. The story, writing style, the world, characters, all continue in the same vein with raised stakes,

El and Orion are still the most awkwardly perfect and clueless pairing ever. In this book, we get to see how their relationship as well as all of El's other friendships and alliances grow and become stronger.

El herself continuously gets stronger as she embraces her powers and starts to except herself as who she is instead of who she thinks she is or how she wants to portray herself to others.

The world of the school is still incredibly well put together. And in this book, we get more understanding into the workings of the school and its history. This is easily my favorite part of these books. I find Scholomance so intriguing and imaginative.

Similar to the first one, though possibly more so, this is not the fastest book, you don't get to the crux of the issue until about 70% in. Some of the worries of the characters, the plotting they do, etc gets thrown out the window as soon as you get to this point, but I guess that's how life is as well, making plans until you're thrown a curve ball and you have to start all over. Even in the slower parts there's a lot to enjoy, mainly thanks to the very strong world building of the school.

The meandering, segue-heavy, stream-of consciousness, way of writing that the author does is possibly even more prominent in this one (or at least it felt more obvious to me). So if you don't enjoy that style of writing, that's something to take note of.

That cliffhanger ending will have you yelling at the book, and wishing the next one was out already. I sure don't know how I'm gonna wait a whole year.

Overall, a strong continuation of the Scholomance world that will drag you deeper into it. It will have you guessing as to what will happen next, and leave you wanting more.

** 4.5 stars **

Wow

What story. What a Cliffie!!

I ask for forgiveness. I had a really hard time getting into the last book (or the first book in this series). I found that it was slow and weighted down by the possibility of the unneeded backstory of the history of the world of magic that Novik created. It all seemed so extraneous and slowed the story down. Having read the two books back-to-back, the harmony of it works overall between just these two books when it comes to the history of world-building. What I thought was a slow plot in book 1, is a nonstop adventure to try to escape the school alive.

Novik somewhere along the way changed my perspective of this school that is suppose to be protecting magical children from a magical prison meant to as Mal food trough to a school that is trying to make children stronger to face the mals. It all happened by giving glimpses beyond what was expected. It was that subtle storybuildling that she had done throughout the two books.

All of the characters really grow and find themselves in this book and while there are moments that are awkward, they are teens that have spent over 4 years trapped in a school fighting for their lives, romance was the last thing any of them thought about. So those moments are rather catch perfect in which they take place, embarrassment and feelings of "where do we go from here".

This book totally saved this series for me and with its ending of a Cliffie. . . Man, oh, man it's going to be hard to wait to see what happens next. The book left me feeling on the verge of so much hopefulness and wonder for El and Orion, but in the next sentence speechless. I really need to know that these two make their dreams come true. You have won me over NNovik. You got me to the end as always.

** Thank you to NetGalley, Del Ray, and the author for the opportunity to review an advanced copy of this book. The opinions are my own and were not influenced by others. **

I don't have the right words for this book. The first in the series was one of the defining books of 2020 for me - a perfect balance of anger and hope. This one kicks the stakes up even further, as our heroine, El, learns more about what her true purpose in the world could be, as she starts looking at systemic rather than individual injustice, and what it takes to reimagine a world entirely. There are surprises and connection and ratcheting tension throughout the book, and then you get to the end and AAAAAAAAAAH I HATE YOU NAOMI NOVIK PLEASE WRITE/RELEASE THE NEXT BOOK IMMEDIATELY (jk I love you but seriously you have Done Things with this book that must be resolved before I can move on with life).

What an incredible sequel! I know Novik's writing best through Uprooted and Spinning Silver. While I knew that she had another successful series, I'd never experienced her ability to follow through with a story before. WOW. This was such a great follow up to A Deadly Education and ends on such a fantastic cliffhanger that I'm in agony waiting for the third book.

I so enjoyed <i>A Deadly Education</i> and couldn't wait to start this one: what would happen next at the Scholomance? This has less about the school classes and set-up and more about how the school itself works. We have the induction part, which is a little glossed over, and then we're into senior year. El and her two friends seem set to be ready to try to survive graduation, and honestly, what better metaphor for graduation than fighting monsters while trying to get to the real world? Oliver is off being, well, Oliver. And then things don't seem to be right. El notices changes from what usually happens (or what students have been told usually happens) and slowly figures out what to do, and then has to convince everyone to follow her. How her Dark Prophecy will affect all that isn't explored, but the nature of friendship and teams and teenage angst and working partnerships are, in ways that may not seem to be lessons but that teens will respond to. I can't wait for the next book!!

eARC provided by publisher via Netgalley.

I love books that have magic schools and this was no exception. It's the sequel to A Deadly Education and continues the story nicely. I usually don't do well with creepy things but this wasn't bad for me. I really enjoyed seeing the politics between the different sections of the school along with El's evolution as a character. The cliffhanger at the end had me screaming so be aware that you'll be on the edge of your seat waiting for the next book!

60% of the book was filler sadly. Also I knew this was how it was gonna end!!!!! The entire time I was reading I had this nagging feeling in the back of my head that something would happen to __ and damn it, it did.

I wish I could say I am excited for the third book but honestly, I'm kinda dreading it? This book series just doesnt scream "happy ending" to me even tho our characters very much deserve it.

In the second book in the Schoolomance trilogy, Novik has created a dark, frightening world. Children with magical abilities have little chance for survival as they come into their powers in the outside world. The Scholomance that has been created to educate them and protect them is little better with its own complex dangers. Inside the school, the maleficaria creep in to ambush them from unexpected nooks and crannies killing hundreds. The enclaves of wealthy kids defend their members and at best leave others to struggle alone for food and safety. The enclavers coldly take advantage of them any way they can. El struggled alone with no friends even before entering the scholomance, but she unexpectedly begins to form alliances that turn into friendships. Oddest of all is the friendship of Orion the annoying "hero" that seems bent on saving everyone including El whether or not she needs saving. As the plot progresses and conditions in the school worsen, El finds herself in the position of leading the disparate groups to unite in order to survive.

The Scholomance trilogy/series exhibits the same fine writing and world building that Naomi Novik demonstrates in her other award winning novels.

The Last Graduate is a worthy sequel to a Deadly Education taking the baton of further developing the characters, magic system, and overall setting. Overall I really enjoyed the increasing wit of the main character and how she interacts with the world. A few notes about this title:

1. First and foremost this is a hard sequel from A Deadly Education, picking up immediately from the first book. A lot of the set up and payoffs in this book were established in Deadly Education, so you will need to read it before starting The Last Graduate.

2. If you liked Deadly Education then you will even more enjoy this book. More of the same wit banter and drama but cranked up to eleven for this.

3. There are a few plot threads from the previous book that are paid off in this book. Likewise some plot threads are left open from this book and the previous book that will hopefully be paid off in the sequel to this one.

4. There is a lot more focus on the supporting cast seeing them go through their own character arcs from the perspective of the main character. (still first person all throughout the book like the last one). There was a great deal more depth to the supporting cast this time around and I'm here for it.

5. This book does suffer from middle child syndrome of books. While there is a very awesome conclusion of the main story thread, there are a bunch of major threads left open for the final book to resolve. So the ending did leave me adrift wanting more and knowing I have to wait a long while to see the final resolution.

In the end if you liked Deadly Education you will enjoy The Last Graduate just as much if not more. This will leaving yearning more from this series. As for myself I deeply enjoyed this book all the way through doing mental cheers and laughs. If you like a well thought out fantasy lore, with witty and dynamic characters, and just a fun time all around, then I highly recommend this book.