A Deadly Education: A Novel

Naomi Novik

Sep 2020 · The Scholomance Book 1 · Sold by Del Rey

About this ebook

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the author of Uprooted and Spinning Silver comes the first book of the Scholomance trilogy, the story of an unwilling dark sorceress who is destined to rewrite the rules of magic.

FINALIST FOR THE LODESTAR AWARD • “The dark school of magic I’ve been waiting for.”—Katherine Arden, author of the Winternight Trilogy

I decided that Orion Lake needed to die after the second time he saved my life.

Everyone loves Orion Lake. Everyone else, that is. Far as I’m concerned, he can keep his flashy combat magic to himself. I’m not joining his pack of adoring fans.

I don’t need help surviving the Scholomance, even if they do. Forget the hordes of monsters and cursed artifacts, I’m probably the most dangerous thing in the place. Just give me a chance and I’ll level mountains and kill untold millions, make myself the dark queen of the world.

At least, that’s what the world expects. Most of the other students in here would be delighted if Orion killed me like one more evil thing that’s crawled out of the drains. Sometimes I think they want me to turn into the evil witch they assume I am. The school certainly does.

But the Scholomance isn’t getting what it wants from me. And neither is Orion Lake. I may not be anyone’s idea of the shining hero, but I’m going to make it out of this place alive, and I’m not going to slaughter thousands to do it, either.

Although I’m giving serious consideration to just one.

With flawless mastery, Naomi Novik creates a school bursting with magic like you’ve never seen before, and a heroine for the ages—a character so sharply realized and so richly nuanced that she will live on in hearts and minds for generations to come.

The magic of the Scholomance trilogy continues in The Last Graduate and The Golden Enclaves

“The can’t-miss fantasy of fall 2020, a brutal coming-of-power story steeped in the aesthetics of dark academia. . . . A Deadly Education will cement Naomi Novik’s place as one of the greatest and most versatile fantasy writers of our time.”—BookPage (starred review)

“A must-read . . . Novik puts a refreshingly dark, adult spin on the magical boarding school. . . . Readers will delight in the push-and-pull of El and Orion’s relationship, the fantastically detailed world, the clever magic system, and the matter-of-fact diversity of the student body.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Ratings and reviews

Solid book with a fairly interesting magic system, likable characters, and intriguing world building. I like that magic in this world has a limit to how often it can be used. It really helps with the usual trope of people just magicing problems away. My only complaints are that despite it being a somewhat short book, it can sometimes feel very long. It feels like the book is constantly going off on tangents, albeit tangents that provide some nice world building. It gets tiring after a while and I would have liked to see the world building be done in a more organic way. Also the main character can be a little too edgy and teenagery at times, but I'm pretty sure this is a YA series so I'm not gonna hold it against the book.

I really don't get the hype. The world the author has made is full of violent creatures and just overall kinda unpleasant.

Oh my gosh, I loved this book SO much. Give me a cranky, self-aware, being good despite herself and her massive evil power potential, main character and I love it every time. Throw in a great set of supporting characters and a magic boarding school that is literally trying to kill them, and I'm all in. My only regret is that I discovered this the same year it was published and so I cannot instantly go read the (future) books in the series. This is one of my favorite books of the year.

About the author

Naomi Novik is the New York Times bestselling author of A Deadly Education, The Last Graduate, and The Golden Enclaves,  the award-winning novels Uprooted and Spinning Silver, and the Temeraire series. She is a founder of the Organization for Transformative Works and the Archive of Our Own. She lives in New York City with her family and six computers.