I find it quite difficult to review this book. My rating is purely from my enjoyment because I was too busy enjoying myself to pay attention to the structure and the technicalities of this book. I did not even notice the purple prose writing, which this book has.
To be honest, I had expected this book to be darker. Don't get me wrong, it was a dark book, but the way people talked about it and after reading The Poppy War, I expected it to be darker than that, and it wasn't. Also, if you liked The Poppy War, I highly encourage you to give this book a chance, they both have a school setting, a female main character that tries to make the best choices but sometimes fails, and in both books, the main character has a special gift compared to the other students.
This book felt like a Hogwarts story set in medieval times with dark aspects, which makes it a perfect book for adults. The school setting felt perfect, the library felt magical, and the classes were interesting.
First, the first chapter. Personally, I felt like this was done extremely well, I have never read two scenes so different interwoven so intense. It was confusing, but also intriguing, and it made me want to read further.
I enjoyed Mia's character a lot. She felt complex, had an interesting backstory, and she was not only good, which I often see in the main characters. Some side characters were really developed, like Tric, Naev, Marielle, while others were really flat and could use some more personality.
The plot itself was intriguing. I was constantly intrigued and wanted to read more, get to know more about this book and its world, and understand what was happening. I must admit the final plot twist was half to be expected. From halfway through the book I had a theory about Ash killing the other students, but I did not have any proof yet. When it was revealed in the end, I wanted to be like 'I knew it!', but I couldn't because it was so much more complex as I had imagined. For me, this made the book even ten times better. If an author can make you feel a plot twist even when you already figured out the plot twist than it's a damn good author (and book of course). Note that for this to work, the plot twist must make sense, otherwise it is just ridiculous.
Please pick this book up if you are not afraid of dark topics in your book and want to read some dark Hogwarts school settings (without that kind of magic).