The Scholomance Series: Review

I have recently finished reading The Scholomance Series written by Naomi Novik, a fantasy, dark academia which follows the main character, Galadriel Higgins, on her journey through her deadly school filled with magic and monsters. Galadriel is a chosen loner with a dark backstory. She is quickly catapulted into an array of problems, which she has to solve in order to make her days in the scholomance at least a little bearable, and makes a few friends along the way. Throughout the three book in this series - A deadly Education, The Last Graduate and The Golden Enclaves- we see action, plot-twists and a load of emotions.

My First Impressions

The first book is set halfway through junior year and Galadriel already knows a lot about spells and how The Scholomance operates. I was immediately surprised with the amount of backstory and information about Galadriel and the history of The Scholomance and the Enclaves around the world. Naomi Novik created a diverse and interesting set of characters we are quick to hear about, as well as imaginative and truly horrifying monsters that quietly lurk in the walls of the school. Immediately, my favourite character became Orion, I was instantly drawn to his mysterious personality and needed to know intentions. I felt like the dynamic between Galadriel and Orion truly captured the awkwardness of teen friendships and the pathway to romance. El's friends, Aadhya and Luisa initially felt a bit stale through the first book, but I grew to like them later, in the second book. The action in the first book really kept me turning the pages and I thoroughly enjoyed the dialogue, which does include a bit of vulgarity and cursing and is continued by all three books, especially El, who is incredible blunt and comically rude. I rate this book a 4/5 stars.

My opinion of the second book is definitely not as positive as the first. We join back with El and her friends at the beginning of senior year, where they have to prepare for the final battle to be able to leave The Scholomance. The second book includes a lot more backstories of Orion, Aadhya and Luisa and we get to see a lot more of what Galadriel is truly capable of. The Last Graduate has a lot less action, is very repetitive and a lot slower to read in my opinion, but we do get to see Orion and Galadriel's relationship grow, which I was very excited about. I did find that I didn't enjoy a lot of the first half of the book and felt that a lot of it was filler, which I was disappointed about. Towards the end however, I became more engrossed in the book, as it was more action packed and emotional. I rate this book a 3/5 stars.

Book three filled me with a whole range of emotions. The Golden Enclaves starts after El and her friends have just left The Scholomance after 4 years of being trapped away from society. We finally get to meet Els mum, where she instantly fills us in with a lot of important and ground breaking information. El's friends come to find her and inform her that they need her help, putting El's plans and emotions on hold. From the beginning I thought the plot was a bit guessable, but that changed as soon as I hit the halfway point, where a bigger problem appears in the form of an enemy. I have to admit I did fall into a bit of a reading slump in the beginning because I was so mad at the plot, but I pulled myself out when I realised Naomi Novik had other plans in store. I have to say this book definitely stirred my emotions quite a lot and I became at one with the characters. I am happy with how the other two books tied into the plot of this book and also happy the ending, but at the same time I wish Novik would have been more adventurous. I rate this book a 3/5 stars.

Pros

• Full backstories on a lot of the characters.

• Filled with information and history.

• Serious and funny at the same time. Galadriel gave me vibes of Grace from How To Kill Your Family.

Cons

• Long Chapters. If you're a reader like me you like short, but full chapters.

• Quite an advanced read with large words and swearing.

• You have to read the whole series to know what is happening in my opinion.

Conclusion

To conclude, The Scholomance Series is a dark, gore-filled but emotional trilogy suitable for Older teens and young adults, as there is mention of death, murder, cursing and sexual scenes. I would recommend this series to anyone who loves to dig deep into the lives of their characters and feel truly immersed in books. This book is something unique and I hope that anyone who reads this feels all the anger, confusion and happiness that I did whilst reading. Overall, I give this series a 4/5 stars because the characters, monsters and magic are completely unique to any fantasy books or movies I have ever seen and I love how everything gets perfectly tied up in the end.

To anyone who has read this book, feel free to comment your opinion in the comments and to anyone wanting to read these books, I hope I helped you come to your decision. I would greatly appreciate if you would consider following my blog and joining my book club group if you liked this post, and contact me with any requests or questions you may have.