Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC of An Education in Malice. As someone who absolutely adored A Dowry of Blood, I was so excited to read this. It did not disappoint! It felt like such a classic vampire story and I loved the open end. The only thing it left me with was wanting more! I wish this was longer. I hope to revisit this world again and hear more about Carmilla and Laura and their new adventures. It felt like we were just getting started. Overall, it was a great story, expertly written, but in the end, I wanted more.

An Education in Malice By S.T. Gibson Fantasy / Horror / Romance / Vampire / Dark Academia / LGBTQIA+ FEB 2024 An Education in Malice created a world of vampires and gay love that I thoroughly enjoyed. Honestly the beginning wasn’t my favorite, but I thought if the story progressed a bit, I would like it and thankfully I did. The beginning is a little awkward and slow. I did not enjoy the slightly awkward relationship between student and teacher. I think it could’ve been handled better. I did like the relationship between Laura and Carmilla. Each chapter gave the point of view of a specific character. I think that was a great choice that way you can see the world Gibson’s created through multiple viewpoints. The story was very easy to follow although at times it did make me want to pull my hair out due to some of the choices the characters made. Along with wanting to pull my hair out the story made me laugh and cry which in my opinion makes for a good story. If you like vampires, lesbians and Carmilla in general I think this was a fresh take on vampire love story and a good LGBTQIA+ story.

2.5 ⭐

This was my first S.T. Gibson, and honestly, it was kind of disappointing.

An Education in Malice is a retelling of J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla. Set at an all-girls boarding school in Massachusetts, this book follows Laura, a newcomer to the school, and Carmilla, a senior, as they compete for the attention of one of the school’s professors.

An Education in Malice explores rivalry, obsession, lust, and relationships with unbalanced power dynamics. It’s split into two POVs, which was one of the things I was not a fan of. I think that the story would’ve been more engaging if Carmilla remained an enigma to the reader, rather than us knowing exactly how she felt about Laura and her relationship with De Lafontaine.

Laura intrigued me in the first half of the book, but then it seemed as if certain character traits mentioned in the first half completely fell away by the end. I felt the same way about Carmilla; she seemed interesting and complex in the beginning, but her POVs started to dull, sometimes becoming too self-aware.

And De Lafontaine - ugh. I just feel like all of the characters had the potential to have depth, but unfortunately they didn’t do it for me.

I also HATED the ending. It felt rushed and then went right to neat and tidy.

I liked S.T. Gibson’s writing style, though. Not overly flowery, but still had a nice lyrical quality to it. I’m still gonna check out A Dowry of Blood, so hopefully I like that better than this one!

Huge thank you to NetGalley and the Redhook & Orbit team for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review!