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January 21, 2014 by Karen Jensen, MLS

Book Review: The School for Good and Evil, reviewed by our tween reviewer Ceci

January 21, 2014 by Karen Jensen, MLS   4 comments

Apparently today is a good day for nontraditional schools of paranormal creatures.  Tween reviewer Ceci shares her thoughts after reading The School for Good and Evil by Soman Chainani.

Publisher’s Annotation:

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.

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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…?

The School for Good & Evil is an epic journey into a dazzling new world, where the only way out of a fairy tale is to live through one

Ceci’s Review:

The school for good and evil,is about two girls, one named Sophie and one named Agatha. Sophie is all about helping people and being the most kindest sweetest girl in all of Galdoven. She is determined to go to the school of good! 

Agatha on the other hand lives in a cemetery. Sophie is her only friend except for her scraggly old cat. She doesn’t believe in fairy tales and she thinks Sophie is crazy. She just wants to stay put.

But then when a mysterious shadow comes along and drags Sophie in to the woods Agatha runs after her. Then the shadow takes them BOTH and hands them off to a swan. When the swan is about to drop Sophie into the school of good, Agatha tries to stop him to save her. The swan gets confused and drops them in the wrong school. Things get bad. To Sophie’s surprise she is doing well, not a good thing. Agatha is trying hard but things are worse for her. Then when Sophie gets a higher score then anyone everyone thinks she is 100% evil. Even Tedros,who Sophie thinks is her true love. When the blue forest trail comes up things get 100 times bad. Sophie starts the second war the school has ever seen. What will happen next? Will sophie die? Will there be no more schools?

Find out in The School For Good And Evil. Recommended for ages 8-100. This review is based on the opinion of Ceci, who loved this book. This review is by Ceci.

The sequel comes out in April of 2014 and they revealed the cover back in August at Entertainment Weekly.

Filed under: Book Reviews, Soman Chainani, The School for Good and Evil

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About Karen Jensen, MLS

Karen Jensen has been a Teen Services Librarian for almost 30 years. She created TLT in 2011 and is the co-editor of The Whole Library Handbook: Teen Services with Heather Booth (ALA Editions, 2014).

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Care Morency says

    January 21, 2014 at 7:44 pm

    Thanks for the review! This sounds like a great book.

  2. Jennifer Rummel says

    January 21, 2014 at 7:46 pm

    I've been wanting to read this, it looks really good 🙂

  3. Elvie Richter says

    January 21, 2014 at 7:50 pm

    Thanks for the review Ceci!

  4. maria.selke says

    January 22, 2014 at 2:21 pm

    Great review, Ceci! I have a student who is currently reading this book… and it looks intriguing!

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