First, let me tell you that Noemi Novik is one of my favorite authors. She along with Katherine Arden can transport you in magical worlds and make you feel like being part of them. She's exactly what I love at a true storyteller. So, after having read Uprooted and Spinning Silver, I was counting the months until her latest, A Deadly Education would be released on the 29th of September.
Almost immediately, I bought the book and dived right into it. However, this time the whole reading process didn't resemble at all her previous books. Where should I start?
Let's start by the way of her writing, it was more like she was informing us, telling us the story instead of using her craft to transport us there. I don't know how to explain this but this story felt more like reading a report than fiction.
This book had so many facts and information about the world she decided to create that she forgot to develop the plotline. It's like minimum action, maximum info bump. Her main character often while she was in peril, she would freeze her action to inform us about historical trivia that, to be honest, wasn't necessary at that point. I was really tired having to digest and process all this income of info that could have been nicely explained in a prequel maybe?
I think that she wanted to create a similar magical world to Harry Potter's, and although her world was promising. She failed at the execution, she failed where J.K.Rowling was successful to immerse us in her fictional universe, giving the necessary extra info at the appropriate moments, without making us bored.
Her main character was also quite difficult to connect to. I liked Galadriel aka El, I liked her snarky character but I think it was again exaggerated at times, especially at moments where she was supposed to be "growing" out of it. She was a bit too cynical and rude, and although I know that was on purpose as traits of her "dark" nature, this was coming in antithesis with her actions that were quite thoughtful and nice at the same time. In fact, she was just a lonely girl that everyone disliked for no reason, and what I mean is that it was repeated throughout the book that everyone who came in contact with her was directly cross with her and Novik cannot really "persuade" us as to why this happened. El behaves rudely to everyone apart from her two girl-friends towards whom she's really nice and considerate.
Also, multiple times we hear her telling us how capable she is in the dark arts, yet we barely see her use her gifts. She repeatedly informs us without leaving out any details of all her vast knowledge yet she seems to be so helpless and scared all the time. She can easily be a destroyer, but she chooses to be dependent on others for her survival. She nearly dies once or twice, and although she's OBVIOUSLY stronger than her rival, she's acts hopelessly and needs someone to save her. I didn't like how contrasting her character was, badass one moment and scared like a mouse another. The lack of consistency tired me and confused me.
There were also many stalling or like pause moments during a very fast and full of action scene, where we were for nearly two pages in her mind, just listening to her overthinking or giving us a historical overview, instead of seeing her in action.
And then there was the character of Orion Lake, the male main love interest. He was presented as the selfless and charismatic golden boy, who ended up being more "naive" and clueless than she wanted us to see him. Orion was a freaking SAINT.
And, unfortunately, that meant he was colorless, tasteless, and in general so flat and empty that he was indifferent all together. El and Orion were in some twisted way friends, although I don't think why he would like to be friends with El after all her rude behavior towards him.
So, they were more like "friends" although by the end of the book they were supposedly shown to be starting dating. There was zero attraction or chemistry to persuade us that there was anything even remotely romantic. There were no words or phrases that could claim that she or he was interested in each other in any other way apart from being buddies.
They were supposed to be "fake" dating throughout the book, but Orion apparently didn't know about it and the only thing that made them appear a couple was that they were spending too much time together. I think Novik needs to see how teens date nowadays. Even their first kiss that was placed during a life-threatening moment, you know when emotions run high and you are full of adrenaline, towards the end of the book that could easily remind us the first kiss between Hermione and Ron, even that kiss felt flat, emotionless and boring. There was zero escalation of feelings that could make us looking forward to it, anticipating it.
The book finished in a happy note although there was some mild I would say "cliffhanger" that made us look forward to the next installment.
In general, I didn't hate it but I didn't love it either. It would be so much more but unfortunately, it kinda failed in that aspect. However, I am going to read the next one, hoping that Novik will go back to her old writing style!
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