Briskly Paced An Academy for Liars Is a Delightfully Dark Twist on the Magical Boarding School Setting
Dark academia is everywhere in publishing right now. Whether it’s because of the sub-genre’s autumnal aesthetic and generally Gothic feel, or the fact that a lot of people are looking for the sort of magical boarding school vibes epitomized by Harry Potter with more adult themes. (Not to mention higher body countes.) After writing both dark historical fiction like (Year of the Witching) and some genuinely disturbing horror (House of Hunger), maybe dark academia was always going to be a natural next step for an author like Alexis Henderson, who seizes the chance to ground her morally gray characters and bloody body horror in a more contemporary setting with An Academy for Liars.
The twisty, briskly paced story—fair warning: I tore through it in two days—wrestles with questions of power, control, and agency, as well as who is (and should be) allowed access to those things. None of its characters, not even its ostensible heroine, are particularly likable people, which somehow adds to the larger emotional stakes of the story. (I don’t think anyone particularly likable would end up as a student at this particular magical institution.) And while the book tackles many themes and tropes that will be familiar to regular readers of this genre—ambition, corruption, a desperate desire to be deemed worthy by a system greater than yourself—it navigates their complexities with refreshingly clear eyes and a perspective we don’t often see represented in this space.
An Academy for Liars follows Lennon Carter, a down-on-her-luck young woman dealing with a cheating fiance and a life that feels like it’s going nowhere fast. But when she receives a mysterious phone call in a mall parking lot telling her she’s been admitted to a strange institution known as Drayton Academy, a school she had not only never applied to, but had never heard of before, she can’t help but be intrigued.
Hidden in Savannah, the seemingly age-old school of magic teaches a select group of students to harness their innate gifts of “persuasion”, an ability which, while it technically may not been mind control, isn’t all far off from it, either. Persuasion, in the strictest sense is the power to enforce your will upon the world around you, whether that means influencing the actions of others or, for a select few, manipulating reality itself. Drayton graduates tend to go on to positions of great power and influence in the realm of geopolitics and government, where they must all ask themselves what they’re willing to do in the name of the greater good. (And whether they can resist the corrupting lure of absolute power that’s essentially baked into the things they can do.)
Alight with a new sense of purpose, Lennon is determined to prove herself to her classmates and teachers—particularly her handsome advisor Dante Lowe. She throws herself into her studies but struggles to access teh full scope of her powers, particularly when it is revealed she is something known as a “gatekeeper,” a persuasion-ist so powerful her mind can open doors through space and time. Lennon’s ultimate path to understanding her abilities is a tortured, bloody one, with its fair share of betrayals and a literal body count. As she slowly learns that Drayton has bigger plans for her than she ever could have imagined, she’ll have to decide how far she’s willing to go to protect herself, her classmates and the strange world she’s come to call home.
Henderson excels at building the world of Drayton, one that’s full of eerie history, lush details, and what often feels like a permanent sense of dread. Lennon is a complicated heroine: A young woman who longs for acceptance and approval, who tends to define herself by the men around her, but who also uncovers the depths of her own strength as the stakes of the story steadily rise. Her Drayton classmates, from toxic ex-hookup Ian to flamboyant drug dealer Claude, are all intriguing (and messed up) enough in their own rights that you’ll wish they got a bit more depth—particularly since most of them and, specifically, their relationships with Lennon—-are pivotal elements of the book’s final act.
If An Academy for Liars has a weakness it’s probably Lennon’s forbidden romance with Dante. His character is not only in a position of power over her throughout the story—he literally administers the admission test she takes to enter Drayton—he constantly keeps information from her, and manipulates her in a way that’s…well, let’s call it problematic to say the least. No one will be surprised to learn that Dante has a dark, messed up history of his own, with a power that’s almost equal to Lennon’s, and a large portion of this story revolves around whether she can—or should—trust him to help her figure out how to wield hers responsibly. Their back-and-forth both crosses boundaries and skirts the edge of being genuinely toxic in ways that only some readers will find enticing. Lennon’s abilities themselves also aren’t well-explained, and despite her dedication to her studies, you’ll have to take a lot of what is presented as her “progression” as read. Their bond fairs better on the few occasions they’re off campus together, which puts the pair on more even ground (though often in overt physical danger.)
It’s hard to deny the propulsive nature of Henderson’s story, which is full of twists, turns, betrayals, and surprise reveals that lend an air of steadily growing tension throughout the story. Is it a little overlong? Maybe. Will you mind all that much? Not really. Dark academia fans will almost certainly eat this up and clamor for more, which means we can only hope Henderson returns to this genre someday sooner rather than later.
An Academy for Liars is available now wherever books are sold.
Lacy Baugher Milas is the Books Editor at Paste Magazine, but loves nerding out about all sorts of pop culture. You can find her on Twitter @LacyMB