🎉Happy new year everyone! Here's the first video of 2021 from me. Hope you enjoy! Let me know your thoughts if you have read A Deadly Education, and if not, what was the latest book you read that you were disappointed by?
Almost done with the book. I really like the protagonist because I kind of get where she's coming from. Her disdain for everything and everyone around her is a bit overboard but what kept me going was the progress she made as a person. Seeing her subtle acknowledgement of friendships even if still under the guise of benefit is adorable. I connected with the way she felt evil or feared, superiority complex, loneliness but not so much her overwhelming negativity. The good outweighed the bad here and a few jokes here and there helped for sure. Also I loved the part where she basically used one of her mother's master spells to help that other girl. It felt like bonding without lingering on it for too long.
El reminds me of those grumpy prickly people who's a teddy bear on the inside. I feel like this would make a good movie adaptation. I get her family background but I still keep picturing her as a young Eliza Dukshu (Faith from Buffy) 🤣
Its a shame how a Bad narrative ruins an interesting plot, before i Start reading it i better wait for the second book to come out and what ppl say whether it gets better or not.
I completely agree about the ratio of telling vs. action. When two-thirds of the book is internal monologues it just completely takes the reader out of the story. I really like this author's work, but this book was very hard to get through. What I wish is that all the internal monologues and flashbacks were included as something like dreams where El has to re-fight the monsters from her past. This would shift everything away from info dumping and help explain some of her abilities/power. It would also completely fit with the theme by introducing "nightmares". In addition it would set up a choice between getting sleep and maybe having to re-fight your worst experiences or not getting sleep and slowly going insane.
I love your vlog style review. Maybe I'm a newbie, but I haven't seen it done before. Gives a great insight into the whole reading experience of the book.
Honestly, I enjoyed A Deadly Education (3.5/5). It definitely wasn't as good as I hoped it would be - the 'telling' over 'showing' was an issue for me, but I had less of an issue with El, I actually found her antagonistic grumpiness rather entertaining ^^ Even though I expected more from Novik - especially after Spinning Silver - I still look forward to the sequels in hopes that they will have less info-dumping and more telling of a story. The whole murder school concept is just too good to sit this one out ;) PS: Novik seems to write like it or hate it main characters frequently, my biggest issue with Uprooted was my absolute frustration and annoyance with Agnieszka ^^
Haha that's interesting, because I don't remember having any issue with Agnieszka but El on the other hand...I will also still keep reading her books, it hasn't put me off completely, I was just disappointed in the way this was done.
@@IasminaEdina Yeah, I get that. I was pretty hyped for Deadly Education, and it definitely didn't live up to my expectations. Regarding Uprooted: Agnieszka was just too goody two shoes and a bit too Mary Sue-ish for my tastes. I'm interested to hear what you have to say about Spinning Silver and Miryem once you get around to reading it :)
@@Grimscribe732 I just got Spinning Silver and I cannot wait to read about Miryem! I personally liked El...( I actually kept picturing her as Eliza Dukshu...Faith from Buffy). But i found the whole prickly on the outside soft on the inside thing really endearing. I dig her dynamic with Orion too; it's adorable. I am on Lesson 2 of the Scholomance now!
Have you read Vita Nostra by Marina Dyachenko? To my mind that was what The Magicians tried to be, but mostly failed. Dysfunctional school of magic set in Russia, a very dense read, and candidly a confusing one as well. Big downside is only the first book has been translated into English, at least as best I can tell. And since the trilogy was published from 2007 to 2010, I'm not sure a translation will ever happen. Pity, because it was a very interesting read.
I wasn't let down at all. I think I read it five times in a row when I first got it. The Solomonar is my favorite myth and I love how Novik makes a lot of subtle references to it, but updates it to a modern setting. I also love Galadriel as a character and don't find her annoying or ungrateful at all. If you look at it from El's point of view, Orion saving her doesn't make him a hero. He's a dangerous lunatic who's upsetting the cosmic balance and dooming them all to a terrible death later. She has every right to call him out on his shit. I also really enjoy how hard El has to work not to accidentally murder all of her classmates (even though almost all of them deserve it). The examination of classism and systemically abusive power structures was handled well and gave the book something of substance to talk about (as opposed to the thousands of boring LOTR knock offs that pass for fantasy nowadays). The best part was El slowly making real friends in a world where everyone operates in a constant state of total paranoia and selfishness and absolutely every interaction is transactional in nature.
i think scholomance comes from english roots. Mancy is used to indicate a magical artform like necroMANCY. And Scholo is from scholar which is one who goes to school. SO scholomance I think translate more to school magic. Ormaybe both.
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🎉Happy new year everyone! Here's the first video of 2021 from me. Hope you enjoy! Let me know your thoughts if you have read A Deadly Education, and if not, what was the latest book you read that you were disappointed by?
I was only able to read Spinning Silver. I will put this in my TBR this year. Thanks, Iasmina. 🥰🤓😍
Almost done with the book. I really like the protagonist because I kind of get where she's coming from. Her disdain for everything and everyone around her is a bit overboard but what kept me going was the progress she made as a person. Seeing her subtle acknowledgement of friendships even if still under the guise of benefit is adorable. I connected with the way she felt evil or feared, superiority complex, loneliness but not so much her overwhelming negativity. The good outweighed the bad here and a few jokes here and there helped for sure.
Also I loved the part where she basically used one of her mother's master spells to help that other girl. It felt like bonding without lingering on it for too long.
El reminds me of those grumpy prickly people who's a teddy bear on the inside. I feel like this would make a good movie adaptation.
I get her family background but I still keep picturing her as a young Eliza Dukshu (Faith from Buffy) 🤣
Great review!
I'm still going to read it because it was one of my birthday presents 😄
Of course, maybe your experience will be better than mine 😊
Its a shame how a Bad narrative ruins an interesting plot, before i Start reading it i better wait for the second book to come out and what ppl say whether it gets better or not.
I completely agree about the ratio of telling vs. action. When two-thirds of the book is internal monologues it just completely takes the reader out of the story. I really like this author's work, but this book was very hard to get through.
What I wish is that all the internal monologues and flashbacks were included as something like dreams where El has to re-fight the monsters from her past. This would shift everything away from info dumping and help explain some of her abilities/power. It would also completely fit with the theme by introducing "nightmares". In addition it would set up a choice between getting sleep and maybe having to re-fight your worst experiences or not getting sleep and slowly going insane.
I love your vlog style review. Maybe I'm a newbie, but I haven't seen it done before. Gives a great insight into the whole reading experience of the book.
Honestly, I enjoyed A Deadly Education (3.5/5). It definitely wasn't as good as I hoped it would be - the 'telling' over 'showing' was an issue for me, but I had less of an issue with El, I actually found her antagonistic grumpiness rather entertaining ^^
Even though I expected more from Novik - especially after Spinning Silver - I still look forward to the sequels in hopes that they will have less info-dumping and more telling of a story. The whole murder school concept is just too good to sit this one out ;)
PS:
Novik seems to write like it or hate it main characters frequently, my biggest issue with Uprooted was my absolute frustration and annoyance with Agnieszka ^^
Haha that's interesting, because I don't remember having any issue with Agnieszka but El on the other hand...I will also still keep reading her books, it hasn't put me off completely, I was just disappointed in the way this was done.
@@IasminaEdina Yeah, I get that. I was pretty hyped for Deadly Education, and it definitely didn't live up to my expectations. Regarding Uprooted: Agnieszka was just too goody two shoes and a bit too Mary Sue-ish for my tastes.
I'm interested to hear what you have to say about Spinning Silver and Miryem once you get around to reading it :)
@@Grimscribe732 I just got Spinning Silver and I cannot wait to read about Miryem! I personally liked El...( I actually kept picturing her as Eliza Dukshu...Faith from Buffy). But i found the whole prickly on the outside soft on the inside thing really endearing. I dig her dynamic with Orion too; it's adorable. I am on Lesson 2 of the Scholomance now!
Vampiri si necromancy, lumea o sa creada ca toti suntem prunci din iad :))
Happy New Year, thank you for all your work!
Have you read Vita Nostra by Marina Dyachenko? To my mind that was what The Magicians tried to be, but mostly failed. Dysfunctional school of magic set in Russia, a very dense read, and candidly a confusing one as well. Big downside is only the first book has been translated into English, at least as best I can tell. And since the trilogy was published from 2007 to 2010, I'm not sure a translation will ever happen. Pity, because it was a very interesting read.
I haven't, but it's on my TBR now. Thanks for the recommendation.
@@IasminaEdina Good! All part of my sneaky plan for world domination, errr, to get the rest of the series translated. 😐
I wasn't let down at all. I think I read it five times in a row when I first got it. The Solomonar is my favorite myth and I love how Novik makes a lot of subtle references to it, but updates it to a modern setting. I also love Galadriel as a character and don't find her annoying or ungrateful at all. If you look at it from El's point of view, Orion saving her doesn't make him a hero. He's a dangerous lunatic who's upsetting the cosmic balance and dooming them all to a terrible death later. She has every right to call him out on his shit. I also really enjoy how hard El has to work not to accidentally murder all of her classmates (even though almost all of them deserve it). The examination of classism and systemically abusive power structures was handled well and gave the book something of substance to talk about (as opposed to the thousands of boring LOTR knock offs that pass for fantasy nowadays). The best part was El slowly making real friends in a world where everyone operates in a constant state of total paranoia and selfishness and absolutely every interaction is transactional in nature.
Have you read deadly class? Really cool comic with a kinda similar story just without magic!
I haven't read it, but it's been on my to-read list for years. Thanks for reminding me of it, I might have to pick it up sooner.
Seconded. I've only read up to vol.7
@@IasminaEdina can you recommend othrr books at same style please?i really liked a deadly education waiting for the last book
I think the word you're looking for when you talk about "telling" is Exposition 😁👍🏼
That is also a word for it, yes, but in writerly terms, we talk a lot about "tell vs. show", so "telling" is what I use most to describe exposition.
i think scholomance comes from english roots. Mancy is used to indicate a magical artform like necroMANCY. And Scholo is from scholar which is one who goes to school. SO scholomance I think translate more to school magic. Ormaybe both.
Your have such an familiar Voice, Thays weird hahaha