A Deadly Education (The Scholomance #1) by Naomi Novik

In general, I am a Naomi Novik fan. Her writing tends to be hit or miss for me, but more on the hit side. I have fond memories of the Temeraire series (DRAGONS!), although it does seem like every other book was a bit of a slog. I even thought the first part of Spinning Silver was pretty great. And, just as I had taken A Deadly Education out of the library, a friend told me all about how much she loved it, so I took it as a good sign. A Deadly Education is the first in a trilogy and I don't think it's a spoiler to tell you that I've already requested the other two books from the library.

So what we have here is a magical school. But this is not Hogwarts, with its cushy common rooms and Pomona Sprout to heal our broken bones. This is the Scholomance where death lurks behind every corner and to survive, you have to be lucky, smart, and allied with the right people. El, our heroine, is lucky and smart, but she's an "independent," which is to say that she's not allied with people from an enclave. Because of this, she's really struggling with keeping her magical skills sharp. But then Orion Lake comes along, saving her life, and suddenly she has friends, but the school is getting more and more dangerous.

There's a lot to like here. I am a big fan of the Scholomance and its history. I really dug how there are malaficaria, monsters and evil beasties, everywhere. El was frequently looking under her bed and around corners and even in the mashed potatoes and I really liked how Novik never dropped this, so as a reader, you were always on edge. I liked that we got to see El doing work - building a magic mirror, learning languages, and even doing exercise to build up her magical energy force, mana.  I like how El's friends seemed to come from a variety of backgrounds, racial and class. I liked a lot about this.

But there's also a huge whiff of a romance here. I would definitely liked to see this trilogy go by without a romance. I want a young adult series about bad ass young women in an evil magic school in which the plot ends up being about kissing. I want to see it about them improving their skills, working with other people, and having success that doesn't wrap around a romantic relationship. I do understand that this is a young adult book, and young adults are exploring their sexuality, but, geez. I just don't want it. 

I'll be back for more, though. I can't quit the Scholomance without knowing what becomes of El.

4.5/5 stars

Okay, apparently there's been some controversy about a couple of passages in the book potentially being racially problematic. I think this controversy is overstated, Novik has apologized and intends to change some language in future printings, and I don't think it should dissuade anyone from reading the book. This blog post covers it better than I ever could, so I leave it for you to read at your leisure.

Things I Looked Up:

Burj Khalifa (page 150) - Tallest building in the world, a skyscraper in Dubai.

oubliette (page 275) - A secret dungeon with access only through a trapdoor in its ceiling. This seems like a particularly specialized word and now I'm trying to figure out ways to bring it up in my everyday conversations.