I'm not sure how to rate this book, honestly. On the one hand, there are some absolutely beautiful quotes throughout this book, and it's sort of meta in the way it's commenting on literature analysis. As a literature major, I definitely enjoyed that about the story. Effy and Preston have some great conversations about literature and what it means to them.

However, the world-building is a bit confusing. It's hard to follow at the beginning and took awhile for me to gte into it. I also wish there had been a map included, because they talk about going all these places, but I couldn't really get an orientation for where they were going. Even by the end, the overall world was still a bit unclear to me.

The romance also could have used a bit more development, which might have been because the timeline was also a bit unclear. But! If you're looking for a very atmospheric, dark academia kind of fantasy that's more focused on the academic aspect, this book might be for you.