School for Good and Evil

 By: Soman Chainani

Location: FIC CHA

Genre: Fantasy

The first kidnappings happened two hundred years before. Some years it was two boys taken, some years two girls, sometimes one of each. But if at first the choices seemed random, soon the pattern became clear. One was always beautiful and good, the child every parent wanted as their own. The other was homely and odd, an outcast from birth. An opposing pair, plucked from youth and spirited away.

This year, best friends Sophie and Agatha are about to discover where all the lost children go: the fabled School for Good & Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. As the most beautiful girl in Gavaldon, Sophie has dreamed of being kidnapped into an enchanted world her whole life. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, she knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil.

But when the two girls are swept into the Endless Woods, they find their fortunes reversed—Sophie’s dumped in the School for Evil to take Uglification, Death Curses, and Henchmen Training, while Agatha finds herself in the School For Good, thrust amongst handsome princes and fair maidens for classes in Princess Etiquette and Animal Communication.. But what if the mistake is actually the first clue to discovering who Sophie and Agatha really are…

SERIES REVIEW BY ELLIE ON GODREADS

These books have been so formative to me as a reader, writer, and person for so many years, and it’s surreal to realize that the series ends in just a month and a few days. I’ve grown up hand in hand with these characters— I’ve navigated new school hallways with my paperback carefully tucked in my bag, made my first internet friends in forums on the author’s website, and traveled to my first book conventions in New York City and Charleston because of these stories. Over the years, I’ve recognized so many facets of myself in Sophie, Agatha, and Tedros, and I’ve found my own insecurities and conflicts mirrored in their relationships with one another. I’ve taken solace in their beauty and imperfections, appreciating the validation that their duality brought to me during those scary and magical moments that define growing up.

Now, as I graduate high school and prepare to begin college in the fall, it only makes sense that my childhood friends also graduate school and prepare to face the woods ahead of them, but that doesn’t make this release date all feel any less strange. I’m going to miss these kids. <3

✨June 3rd, 2020✨

I finished the book at 1:30 am last night, and oh my god, I sobbed! I genuinely could not have dreamed of a better conclusion to this series, and I feel so grateful to have gotten such a good ending to a story that matters this much to me. The book was beautiful, bittersweet, satisfying, and so, so rewarding.

It’s been a heavy and challenging year for everyone -- I mean, I was supposed to have my graduation ceremony last night. I've been struggling to get myself moving forward again in the absence of normal rituals, but I think this book is what I needed to finally feel ready for whatever comes next. Closing the back cover of One True King felt an awful lot like closing this chapter of my life -- like some sense of closure.

I really owe so much to this story.