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abinthebooks 's review for:
A Deadly Education
by Naomi Novik
Y’all I’m so disappointed. Like I’m actually mad that I’m this upset I didn’t like this one because this was probably my second or third most anticipated book of last year and I really didn’t like it.
I had so many issues with A Deadly Education. For one, the amount of info dumping in this book was insane! It was nuts. Our main character would be telling us the story and moving it all forward, and then about every 5 - 10 pages we’d get 5 - 10 pages of MORE INFO DUMPING. If not only took me out of the story, but it made me hate the writing.
If you blind folded me and told me to read Uprooted and A Deadly Education then asked me to try and guess the authors, you best believe I would have never in a million years guessed that Naomi Novik wrote the same stories. The writing in her felt so dense and unimaginative where it was the complete opposite in Uprooted. I couldn’t stand how bad the writing was.
I also hated the romance and the characters in here. None of them were likeable in the slightest especially our narrator El. She was so insufferable. This story follows the ”powerful underdog trope” which is such an interesting trope and so many things can come of it, but El wasn’t the write heroine for this sort of trope. She complained do often about being the underdog, but when she had the chance to be cunning and deceitful, she let the opportunities pass her by. There were so many chances for her to earn her place, but she refused them each and every time. It was infuriating.
The 1st person POV in here was also just a terrible choice in my opinion. Sometimes fantasy books just work better in 1st person POV, but this just wasn’t a good choice for this type of book. Especially combined with the amount of info dumping in here, it would have worked so much better for 3rd person POV to just overall world build better.
I think that the magic system in here is interesting, and it’s more on the scale of urban fantasy than anything else I was told it was. But yeah, overall I’m so damn disappointed I really didn’t enjoy this. I was so excited for this last year and all of this year (I’ve had this book on hold at the library since October just begging for a copy, if that doesn’t say anything idk what does).
I had so many issues with A Deadly Education. For one, the amount of info dumping in this book was insane! It was nuts. Our main character would be telling us the story and moving it all forward, and then about every 5 - 10 pages we’d get 5 - 10 pages of MORE INFO DUMPING. If not only took me out of the story, but it made me hate the writing.
If you blind folded me and told me to read Uprooted and A Deadly Education then asked me to try and guess the authors, you best believe I would have never in a million years guessed that Naomi Novik wrote the same stories. The writing in her felt so dense and unimaginative where it was the complete opposite in Uprooted. I couldn’t stand how bad the writing was.
I also hated the romance and the characters in here. None of them were likeable in the slightest especially our narrator El. She was so insufferable. This story follows the ”powerful underdog trope” which is such an interesting trope and so many things can come of it, but El wasn’t the write heroine for this sort of trope. She complained do often about being the underdog, but when she had the chance to be cunning and deceitful, she let the opportunities pass her by. There were so many chances for her to earn her place, but she refused them each and every time. It was infuriating.
The 1st person POV in here was also just a terrible choice in my opinion. Sometimes fantasy books just work better in 1st person POV, but this just wasn’t a good choice for this type of book. Especially combined with the amount of info dumping in here, it would have worked so much better for 3rd person POV to just overall world build better.
I think that the magic system in here is interesting, and it’s more on the scale of urban fantasy than anything else I was told it was. But yeah, overall I’m so damn disappointed I really didn’t enjoy this. I was so excited for this last year and all of this year (I’ve had this book on hold at the library since October just begging for a copy, if that doesn’t say anything idk what does).