THAT DEVIL, AMBITION

At a magical school, students must kill—or be killed.

Fabian, Euphemia, and Credence attend the Stellarium, an elite academy for training honorable magicians. Their honors class teacher, known only as “the Professor,” is a devil—an immortal with a simple objective on his syllabus. Kill him before the semester is over and you pass; fail, and he will kill all 13 students. Given the astronomically high tuition, which they can’t afford, the three friends are also eager to see their tuition forgiven, another part of the deal if they’re successful. Split into three sections—which are named for each of the three leads—this slow-burn novel delves into each character’s machinations, and it quickly becomes apparent that deceit and sabotage run rampant throughout the Stellarium, few will be spared, and even fewer can be trusted. The premise has all the elements dark academia readers wish for: magic, politics, a gothic-tinged setting, and swoonworthy romance. However, Miller mires the narrative in minutiae, exhausting readers’ attention over trivialities that feel irrelevant, leaving more important elements (specifically the overall worldbuilding and magic system) to falter. Occasional odd turns of phrase pull readers out of the story. Nevertheless, devotees of the genre may be able to overlook these missteps, reveling in the omnipresent and precarious balance between life and death, and the author’s pull-no-punches treatment of her characters. Credence has brown skin, and Fabian and Euphemia, who’s queer, read white.

Intriguing but frustratingly unfocused.