A Lesson in Vengeance

Picked up this book from a sapphic book recommendations list and overall, it was fine for me? In early chapters, I felt like if I put it down and forgot about it, I wouldn't pick it back up but around chapter 8 or so, finally got to the point where I was hooked enough to finish it.

Several minor details were distractingly incorrect, namely the fencing and climbing, which, in the face of a character who is a "method writer" felt like the writer of the book could've stood to have some similar practices when writing this. Of the three weapons in fencing, épée is the only one that doesn't wear a lamé. Fencers who value their equipment wouldn't place the tip on the floor, much less with any pressure. Serious climbers, especially Olympic level ones, don't care about Mt Everest--it takes a specific skill set and money for a good guide and enough oxygen to summit Mt Everest but it doesn't require being a good climber and is certainly not what qualifies you as a good climber.

The actual mystery was interesting once it got going, but the execution felt rushed? In a way? It left me unsure of how I was supposed to feel, who I was supposed to feel sympathetic for, and "why" some of these characters did what they did. Overall, I think it just wasn't for me, and that's okay, and think people who know less about fencing and climbing would be able to be taken in by the story itself more successfully without distraction.

There's a common criticism you might see in the reviews of this book - that it should not have been YA, and instead it should have been written as an adult novel. Being a supporter of the complexities and wide range of YA for a long time, I wasn't sure how this could be. And then I read it. This absolutely should have been an adult book. Aside from the content and the absolute uselessness of the characters being high schoolers, it's about the type of story this is. Recently Maggie Stiefvater wrote something about the difference between YA and adult novels, and that it isn't so much about bad words and coming-of-age stories, but rather stories written for people with fewer life experiences. Characters in adult novels travel through the story in a different way than those geared towards teens, who don't have the experience to put certain events in the right context. Similarly, an excellent video from SuperEyePatchWolf on YouTube (a channel that has some great advice about building character and stories through the lens of anime, game design and even pro-wrestling) talks about the inherently adult nature of Cowboy Bebop. Not because of its content or age of its characters, but because of where they are in life - well past their big conflicts, and now waiting in a kind of purgatory before they end their stories.This is exactly where Felicity Morrow is in A Lesson in Vengeance. A year after her girlfriend dies in a terrible accident, leaving rumors swirling about Felicity's part in the incident and Felicity herself struggling deeply with grief and depression, she returns to the elite boarding school, Dalloway, intent on finishing her senior year at one of the few places that hold meaning to her. New to the school is Ellis Haley, the 17-year-old literary prodigy, who has decided to come to Dalloway to write her sophomore novel inspired by the Dalloway Five - a coven of young maybe-witches from the school's early days in the 1700s, who all fell to a mysterious and violent deaths. Enlisting Felicity to help her, since Felicity had once been obsessed with the Dalloway Five and is also a practicing witch who is trying to now stay away from magic for the sake of her sanity, the two get embroiled in a deeply toxic relationship that is obviously going nowhere good.And that honestly is a straightened out version of the major conflict, because A Lesson in Vengeance does not have a particularly strong central narrative. This book, while sumptuously written with atmosphere and character galore, doesn't seem to want hold too tightly to any part of its narrative. Between Felicity's mental health, her girlfriend's death, the Dalloway Five, maybe witches and curses and maybe not witches and curses, and nevermind what Ellis is really trying to accomplish, there's no aspect of this story that really gets put front and center, and as such it all just kind of blurs together. Honestly, I think Victoria Lee should have saved the Dalloway Five for another book, because that plot point just doesn't gets what it deserves here. I think she took all the things that make dark academia what it is (old institutions, murder mysteries, ghosts, morally ambiguous characters, etc), and instead of trying to refine it, tried to cram it all into one narrative (which is one of the pitfalls of trying to make an “aesthetic,” something inherently nebulous, into something concrete).It's interesting that dark academia has fascinated so many young people, and now has resulted in a lot of stories taking it and adapting it for YA narratives. And while “prep school” is one of the potential puzzle pieces that make up dark academia, it's important to not ignore that its seminal text, [b:The Secret History 29044 The Secret History Donna Tartt https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1451554846l/29044.SY75.jpg 221359], is an adult book about college students. Specifically it is about that point in life between adolescence and adulthood where you have so many freedoms, but not a proper understanding of them and your responsibilities to them. Trying to take that square peg and shove it into the round hole of high school life - even when they are deeply privileged and educated high schoolers - is just...weird.This is probably why I felt the most comfortable with this book in its finale, when it goes full Secret History, even paying homage to some of its plot elements. The last fifty pages or so is also where A Lesson in Vengeance finally decides what kind of book it is. This is where Lee embraces the ambiguity of her protagonist, having her do some unforgivable things without passing judgment. Which is not something that is often done in YA. The effect ends up being something along the lines of Baby's First Literary Thriller, which is an idea that I'm not opposed to. The kids gotta learn at some point that their characters can do bad things, even your main character, and that “meaning” goes beyond whether something is morally right or not.That said, for me, the moral bankruptcy of Ellis Haley made it really difficult for me to see her as a sexy love interest. A lot of this book rides on the tension between Ellis and Felicity - otherwise you're basically just watching Felicity wander around reading books and cooking dinner with her housemates - and I was not feeling it all. All I kept thinking was that Ellis was very clearly manipulative and abusive towards Felicity, so I just didn't get it. Cool clothes and a Georgian accent can only get you so far.Overall, I feel a little uncomfortable giving this book a star rating at all. Despite its problems, it shows a lot of skill, and I meant it when I said that I liked the ending a lot, despite the fact that it was a bit of chore to get there. Lee shows great flare for atmosphere and character development, she just bit off more than she could chew with this one, and on top of it wrote it within the constraints of a genre (genre? marketing demographic?) that just handicapped it further. This isn't a great book, but its an interesting thesis on dark academia, on literary conventions and perhaps how far you can push things with teens.

rating update: the more i think about this book, the more upset i get. i need to leave more time between finishing a book and reviewing it because my god in retrospect were some things a hot mess about this book, and i'm not even talking about the weird author bashing a reviewer debacle

the portrayal of a Black character did not sit well with me upon first read, and i'm glad to see that i wasn't the only one. not only did it feel like tokenism (especially since no other side characters play much importance in this book) but the fact that their only purpose in this book is to teach a white character that Racism Exists? holy moly... lots of other weird things that just... did not need to be said with regards to The One Black Character Who Gets A Name. also weird comments about their hair. what i wouldn't give for white authors to stop fixating on Black hair

original review preserved below:

i'm growing increasingly convinced that dark academia is not for me

i think that victoria lee crafted a really spooky and atmospheric little school with messed up girls, but the predictability of the book and the pacing really crushed my enjoyment and by the end i felt exasperated. also, as someone who has read all of the referenced material throughout the book, that also felt like really painful giveaways as to what was going to happen.

overall, i still really liked the world-building and the story behind the dalloway five, but the modern day characters never quite hooked me in and at some points just plain annoyed me. also i'm still wondering what the point of some of the side characters were... but i digress.

so i think with that i'll be approaching any books marketed as dark academia with caution from now on, as i'm regularly disappointed with the execution, but that's on me and not on the authors/writing/stories!