Scan barcode
A review by kistireads
The Last Graduate by Naomi Novik
4.0
Thank you Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group for a gifted copy to read and review, all thoughts and opinions are my own and given voluntarily.
This is the second book in the Scholomance series, the sequel to A Deadly Education, where we follow El, Orion and their friends through their senior year of the Scholomance. This is expected to be their most deadly year.
An overall 3.75 stars from me!
We start off basically right where we left off in the first book, with El and Orion and friends. Since we got most of the Scholomance world building (with pictures and graphs!) in the first book, we don’t need much more here. We do get a bit of scheduling explanations (which do become important) and we do learn more about the enclave regions outside of the school along with the politics that go with those. Those politics are often reflected in school behavior and so do become important throughout the story. Overall, for me, this was woven in really nicely.
Since we do start off where we left off, the atmosphere is similar to the first book, a very dangerous survivalist type school. Things are high stakes and life threatening for the students but with a touch of humor at times. Since El has made friends in the first book, there are some found family and wholesome elements to the sequel more than I found there to be in the first book. I was pretty surprised at this, and didn’t expect it to take that route! I enjoyed where it went even though I was not expecting it, and look forward to more of that in the third book.
The main premise of the plot is not so different from the first book: survive in school both literally and metaphorically. Do you schoolwork, find useful spells and create useful objects etc to take out with you into the world. However, since the atmosphere and plot blend in this bool, I found that the atmosphere took on some of the found family trope, the plot did the same. As the atmosphere became more wholesome, so did elements of the plot. There were points towards the 60-70% mark that were anticlimactic for me. There was a lot of build up, and no culmination to that build up felt disappointing though it is part of the story. There are times where I find the writing to be too detailed from the MC’s perspective. Those paragraphs of details are interesting and make the MC more unique and thoughtful, however they can feel like a lot to slog through when reading the book.
Overall, I had fun reading this book. It’s a different type that I typically read and it’s a quick read. I found certain parts of the plot to be anticlimactic, so I don't know that this would ever be a re-read for me, but I do plan to find out what happens and how the story ends.
This is the second book in the Scholomance series, the sequel to A Deadly Education, where we follow El, Orion and their friends through their senior year of the Scholomance. This is expected to be their most deadly year.
An overall 3.75 stars from me!
We start off basically right where we left off in the first book, with El and Orion and friends. Since we got most of the Scholomance world building (with pictures and graphs!) in the first book, we don’t need much more here. We do get a bit of scheduling explanations (which do become important) and we do learn more about the enclave regions outside of the school along with the politics that go with those. Those politics are often reflected in school behavior and so do become important throughout the story. Overall, for me, this was woven in really nicely.
Since we do start off where we left off, the atmosphere is similar to the first book, a very dangerous survivalist type school. Things are high stakes and life threatening for the students but with a touch of humor at times. Since El has made friends in the first book, there are some found family and wholesome elements to the sequel more than I found there to be in the first book. I was pretty surprised at this, and didn’t expect it to take that route! I enjoyed where it went even though I was not expecting it, and look forward to more of that in the third book.
The main premise of the plot is not so different from the first book: survive in school both literally and metaphorically. Do you schoolwork, find useful spells and create useful objects etc to take out with you into the world. However, since the atmosphere and plot blend in this bool, I found that the atmosphere took on some of the found family trope, the plot did the same. As the atmosphere became more wholesome, so did elements of the plot. There were points towards the 60-70% mark that were anticlimactic for me. There was a lot of build up, and no culmination to that build up felt disappointing though it is part of the story. There are times where I find the writing to be too detailed from the MC’s perspective. Those paragraphs of details are interesting and make the MC more unique and thoughtful, however they can feel like a lot to slog through when reading the book.
Overall, I had fun reading this book. It’s a different type that I typically read and it’s a quick read. I found certain parts of the plot to be anticlimactic, so I don't know that this would ever be a re-read for me, but I do plan to find out what happens and how the story ends.