📕 Title: The Arcane Arts
✏️ Author: S. D. Coverly
📖 Genre: Fantasy Romance / Dark Academia
⭐ Rating: ⭐⭐⭐💫
📝 Open Door/ Explicit Sexual Content

After failing her Arcanus exam, Ellsbeth persuades Thaddeus Rawlins, one of the field’s most celebrated professors, to take her on as a grad student. Under his guidance, Ellsbeth decides to write her thesis on writ magic, the long-forbidden power to control and compel others, and unbeknownst to the other, each has their own reasons for wanting to master this power. As their relationship turns physical, and as their research moves beyond the theoretical, they must figure out if they can truly trust each other.

REVIEW

Thank you Del Rey for the advance copy of this book!

The Arcane Arts is a dark academia fantasy romance in which forbidden magic and erotic desires collide, revolving around a burgeoning romance between a Ellsbeth, a grad student, and Rawlings, her much older professor. The chapters alternate between third person perspective narration and email exchanges between characters.

Rawlings is infuriatingly pretentious, while Ellsbeth is clever and manipulative; their insta-lust romance begins with banter and quickly evolves into more intimate encounters. Given that their research involves controlling people with magic, its application does move beyond academic purposes into more erotic uses, and this book features multiple open door scenes.

Although the story begins with a murder, an event that serves as a catalyst for Ellsbeth, this plotline ultimately falls to the wayside for the majority of the novel. The romance is at the forefront of this novel, with the arcane research following closely behind. While I’m not a fan of professor and student romances, at least she was in her twenties and a grad student. I really enjoyed the exploration of arcane magic, and over the course of the story their romance did grow on me.

While Ellsbeth is a prodigy, it does feel sometimes like her research and development of arcane rituals comes way too easily; there was no real struggle in that sense. Her struggles are more related to someone she lost, and in her growing desire for the man she intended only to manipulate. Sometimes it feels like she and Rawlings are almost too self aware, spending quite a lot of time contemplating the morality their relationship and finding justification for their continued relations, although because Ellsbeth is a grad student it’s more frowned upon than forbidden. Ultimately the real friction in their relationship revolves around trust and how the potential uses of arcane compulsion can erode that trust.

Regardless, this book captivated me more than I expected. While I had my reservations about the romance, it was palatable to me. I really liked the arcane research plot and how everything culminated.