Review by Booklist Review
The magical-school generation has grown up quite a bit and gone through some trouble besides. But here is a story they'll devour, and deserve. Tesh, (Hugo Award--winning author of Some Desperate Glory, 2023), brings readers to Chetwood School, an elite institution ruled over by the sensible, powerful Doctor Saff Walden. Being a teacher is Walden's calling. She's quite good at it, and her work is her life. When a demon starts pressing at the wards of the school, she and irritating Marshall Laura Kenning investigate. But Walden will soon find that the threats to the school run deeper than she's prepared to face. Tesh's novel climaxes, steadies, then builds to a finally blazing, raging final act. Anyone who's ever been an educator, in particular, will love Walden and everything that goes into her love for the school and the cogs that make it run as well as the passion that keeps it going. Powered by instantly relatable characters, peppered with the witty ironies of adulthood and growing up, and scattered with tangible imagery, magic tattoos, vape imps, and possessed school printers, this stand-alone fantasy will be an instant classic among former fans of Professor McGonagall of Harry Potter fame.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Hugo and World Fantasy Award winner Tesh (Some Desperate Glory) puts a fresh spin on dark academia by focusing on school administrators, faculty, and staff. Dr. Sapphire "Saffy" Walden, director of magic at Chetwood School (and an alumna herself), spends her 16-hour workdays managing one crisis after the next. In between, she teaches the Year Seven arcane safety course and maintains the thaumic engines that keep the school from collapsing "out of mundane reality altogether and disappear into the demonic plane, taking six hundred children with it." Walden doesn't have time to fight with the school's chief marshal Laura Kenning, a "butch avenging angel" in charge of magical security, over the inherent risks of her star pupil's ability to summon demons. When said pupil summons an 11th-order archdemon, however, the women must put aside their differences to address the threat. Defeating the beast forces Walden to confront her own demons (real and figurative) and, what's more galling, acknowledge that Kenning may have a point. Focusing on the administrators is a fresh entryway into a popular genre, and "awful nerd with a superiority complex" Walden makes for a fascinating and often humorous narrator. Fans of Naomi Novik's Scholomance series won't want to miss this thoughtful exploration of privilege, power, and private school education. Agent: Kurestin Armada, Root Literary. (May)
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Review by Library Journal Review
As the director of magic at Chetwood School, Dr. Walden must balance her duties as administrator and instructor, along with ensuring that the centuries-old demon-incursion wards stay active. She also engages in battles of will with precocious students and has to deal with too much paperwork, demon-ridden technology, and the prickly head of security, Marshal Laura Kenning. When Walden's students accidentally summon the school's largest demon, Old Faithful, Walden is the only one who has the power to defeat it--with the demon she herself possesses and controls. The result is a series of cascading events, leading to a battle for not only the school but also the outside world. Delving into the lessons of growing up, class differences, and private schools, this exposition-heavy novel still keeps a quick pace through the action, while diving deep into how Walden's past brought her to where she is. VERDICT Recommended for readers of dark academia, Tesh's sophomore novel (after Some Desperate Glory) is an intriguing contemporary fantasy.--Kristi Chadwick
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