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natlonelyghost 's review for:

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik
3.0
dark tense slow-paced
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

It was like reading the life of a sidecharacter. And it was as interesting as that sound.

The writing wasn't bad, the worldbuilding is really interesting even, but God I was so bored all the way through. This is the first book in years I haven't highlighted or noted once, it's incredible even.

El's Pov is so infodump heavy you would read four long paragraphs in a row without a single action in it. Constantly. You leave with a great grasp of the world because of it, but it comes at a total expense of the actual plot being extremely sluggish. Everything that happen in this book feels like it would've taken 1/3 of the time for any other book in the same dangerous magic school genre to do.

Another reviewer said it would beneficiate being a multi pov, and I couldn't agree more. Specially with El's crushing sulking narration, it makes for such a dense experience that is not that fun to cut through. Having someone else's view would've balanced it out.

For such a exposition heavy book, it took me around 30% to find out El was a girl, somehow. And don't ask me how anyone in this book looks like, because beside hair and etinicities, I couldn't tell you at all.

Idk, just, not memorable, will not re-read anytime soon.