📕 Title: An Arcane Inheritance
✏️ Author: Kamilah Cole
📖 Genre: New Adult / Dark Academia Fantasy
⭐ Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐💫

BOOK BLURB

Ellory Morgan, a first year attending Warren University on a scholarship, begins to experience unsettling phenomena and déjà vu. As she grows desperate to rationalize the inconsistencies in her memories, she reluctantly allies with Hudson Graves, a legacy student and get academic rival, to investigate. As they begin to uncover links to a secret society, mysterious deaths, and dark magic, Ellory must find the answer before it’s too late.

REVIEW

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press for the digital copy!

I loved the dark academia aesthetic and the mysterious, occult history of the school. The prose paints immersive scenes and employs allusions to death and graves to heighten the arcane atmosphere. The intrigue builds as Elllory researches the arcane history of Warren University and its connection to the anomalies she is experiencing, a gripping puzzle despite its slow pace. When the pieces began to fall in place, the pace ramped up and it became impossible to put the book down.

While magic plays a significant role in the plot this is more of a low fantasy story, leaning more into the dark academia and secret society elements. It’s not anything like A Deadly Education, where learning magic is the whole point of the school and at the forefront; at Warren University, magic is a secret.

Ellory, a middle class immigrant attending an Ivy League school on a scholarship, is tenacious and intelligent. Ellory’s relationships with other students are well fleshed out and demonstrate the stark difference between her and her weathly, privileged peers. Her experiences at this elitist Ivy League school are a social commentary on racism and classicism, and ultimately offers a satisfying demolition of an institution built on privilege and exclusion. Her story also addresses the pressures of being an immigrant, feeling obligated to pursue a practical job over her dream job.

The romance is strong, with an academic rivals to lover arc, tension, and witty banter. Ellory’s relationship with Hudson is a true slow burn, with a complicated dynamic and competing love interest that kept me guessing about the endgame. There are no open door scenes, but many steamy, tension filled moments.

The ending wrecked me (in a good way!!) and this book further cemented my Kamilah Cole’s status as one of my favorite writers. This book had so many great quotes and I’ll definitely be rereading it, especially for the Ellory and Hudson scenes!