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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
tense
adventurous
dark
funny
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
funny
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
funny
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Not bad. At least inventive with the 'magic school', and the 'I am the chosen one' trope in that the school is probably evil and wants to eat you, and the main character is destined to be some kind of apocalyptic figure.
The book and I got along pretty rough at the beginning, but I did warm up to it over time. I struggled with the worldbuilding and the exposition in the front half. There's a reason why the naive newcomer trope is an effective way to clue the reader in on the setting, since it's a device to allow characters to explain things to the audience as part of the story itself and not break the flow of the narrative. However, since we the audience, we are dropped into the midst of junior year in this hell high school into the mind of a main character who IS intimately familiar with the workings of magic and this school and the work outside, the exposition ends up happening via awkward aside dumps in her interior monologue (basically...lines like, "As you know, X is like Y"). Why would this character be thinking about how *insert thing about her world that everybody should know* at this moment, other than to tell the audience? It was very clunky to me.
(As an aside, I found the constant reminders that nooo the Scholomance is a Dangerous place where people die and go kablooey due to horrific monsters to be very grating, because El, being a self-serving loner who's paranoid and won't step into danger willingly means that we are told about the oh-so-scary danger more than we are shown. Even when El encounters actual monsters, her sarcastic and jaded personality blunts the horror, so I never felt like the school was genuinely threatening.)
As the book went on and I became more familiar with the world, these exposition bits happened less and bothered me less. Finally at the end I was pretty into it, and then it ended. The second book might redeem this story. It has potential.
The book and I got along pretty rough at the beginning, but I did warm up to it over time. I struggled with the worldbuilding and the exposition in the front half. There's a reason why the naive newcomer trope is an effective way to clue the reader in on the setting, since it's a device to allow characters to explain things to the audience as part of the story itself and not break the flow of the narrative. However, since we the audience, we are dropped into the midst of junior year in this hell high school into the mind of a main character who IS intimately familiar with the workings of magic and this school and the work outside, the exposition ends up happening via awkward aside dumps in her interior monologue (basically...lines like, "As you know, X is like Y"). Why would this character be thinking about how *insert thing about her world that everybody should know* at this moment, other than to tell the audience? It was very clunky to me.
(As an aside, I found the constant reminders that nooo the Scholomance is a Dangerous place where people die and go kablooey due to horrific monsters to be very grating, because El, being a self-serving loner who's paranoid and won't step into danger willingly means that we are told about the oh-so-scary danger more than we are shown. Even when El encounters actual monsters, her sarcastic and jaded personality blunts the horror, so I never felt like the school was genuinely threatening.)
As the book went on and I became more familiar with the world, these exposition bits happened less and bothered me less. Finally at the end I was pretty into it, and then it ended. The second book might redeem this story. It has potential.
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
some chapters in this book are interesting because of the action. the others just fill like useless filler chapters. the book was okay but would I want to continue reading the series, no.
adventurous
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Bullying, Child death, Death, Gore, Violence, Medical content, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Blood, Vomit, Stalking, Pregnancy