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sicaurigus 's review for:
A Lesson in Vengeance
by Victoria Lee
What a rollercoaster of a story this was! There are so many things I loved about this book. Felicity being a somewhat unreliable narrator is maybe my favorite of all. Every remembrance of Alex’s demise makes it more and more unclear whether it was really an accident/spur-of-the-moment mistake, and not instead very intentional, especially considering the burial. I would have loved to see Felicity’s instability dug into even more, if possible.
Ellis not being innocent just because she’s queer and a love interest for Felicity was also refreshing. This book didn’t play to the expectation that it was all some kind of misunderstanding and then happily ever after.
Also playing with the assumption that magic would be a facet of this story was fascinating. The reader goes in to the story taking it for granted that magic is gonna be real, and the shocking twist is actually that it ISN’T.
Perhaps the coolest detail is that I’m 99% sure there are no men in the entire book? The principal and named teachers, the shop owner in town, the two cops at the end, the school’s founder—all women. Neither Felicity nor Alex’s dads are ever mentioned, and even Ellis has lesbian moms. Maybe I missed someone but I’m pretty confident there’s not a single boy in the book.
However, as many things as I loved about this book, there were plenty of problems with it too. The blurb claims that “history starts repeating” but that doesn’t really happen. Only one girl dies during the course of the book, and it’s only at the very end, and by that point there’s no mystery as to who did it or whether magic was involved.
Additionally, Ellis’s REASON for doing everything was very simple. I had supposed from her earlier comment about not being able to know the head of a psychopath that that was one of her main objectives: drive Felicity crazy and study her behavior intimately. But no, it was all just for the security that she could blame Felicity if she needs to. Seems like a lot of extra work for a crime that most likely never would have been solved in the first place. (Side tangent: didn’t Felicity forge a note from Ellis confessing to Clara’s murder? Why did no one address that? Ellis’s family didn’t seem phased by it, and Kajal and Leoni went to Ellis’s funeral anyway???)
I’m also confused about the title of the book. It’s called “A Lesson In Vengeance”, but who exactly is taking vengeance here? There’s no revenge to be seen. Neither of Felicity’s murders seemed particularly vengeful, and Ellis’s certainly wasn’t.
The book was fairly meandering too. It dragged in several places and Felicity revisited the same thoughts a lot of the time. And there was too much significance put on the Dalloway Five for how little they actually had to do with anything.
Overall, a pretty fun read!
Ellis not being innocent just because she’s queer and a love interest for Felicity was also refreshing. This book didn’t play to the expectation that it was all some kind of misunderstanding and then happily ever after.
Also playing with the assumption that magic would be a facet of this story was fascinating. The reader goes in to the story taking it for granted that magic is gonna be real, and the shocking twist is actually that it ISN’T.
Perhaps the coolest detail is that I’m 99% sure there are no men in the entire book? The principal and named teachers, the shop owner in town, the two cops at the end, the school’s founder—all women. Neither Felicity nor Alex’s dads are ever mentioned, and even Ellis has lesbian moms. Maybe I missed someone but I’m pretty confident there’s not a single boy in the book.
However, as many things as I loved about this book, there were plenty of problems with it too. The blurb claims that “history starts repeating” but that doesn’t really happen. Only one girl dies during the course of the book, and it’s only at the very end, and by that point there’s no mystery as to who did it or whether magic was involved.
Additionally, Ellis’s REASON for doing everything was very simple. I had supposed from her earlier comment about not being able to know the head of a psychopath that that was one of her main objectives: drive Felicity crazy and study her behavior intimately. But no, it was all just for the security that she could blame Felicity if she needs to. Seems like a lot of extra work for a crime that most likely never would have been solved in the first place. (Side tangent: didn’t Felicity forge a note from Ellis confessing to Clara’s murder? Why did no one address that? Ellis’s family didn’t seem phased by it, and Kajal and Leoni went to Ellis’s funeral anyway???)
I’m also confused about the title of the book. It’s called “A Lesson In Vengeance”, but who exactly is taking vengeance here? There’s no revenge to be seen. Neither of Felicity’s murders seemed particularly vengeful, and Ellis’s certainly wasn’t.
The book was fairly meandering too. It dragged in several places and Felicity revisited the same thoughts a lot of the time. And there was too much significance put on the Dalloway Five for how little they actually had to do with anything.
Overall, a pretty fun read!