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Fans of Twisted Fairy Tales will Love the School for Good and Evil Series
Fractured fairy tale fans know that happy endings are tricky things in the world of Soman Chainani’s School for Good and Evil trilogy, where the descendants of fairy tale heroes and villains compete to be the stars of their own tales, and where fresh stories spill out of an enchanted pen under the watchful eye of the Story Master. Young readers who have not yet discovered this series are in luck—from August 7 through September 3, School for Good and Evil paperbacks are buy one, get one free. For the curious, a primer on this marvelously inventive series is below.
When The School for Good and Evil was released in 2014, it quickly became a best seller. Boys and girls alike were drawn to the story of Sophie, beautiful, pampered, and dreaming of princes, and Agatha, shunned and scrawny, who are each other’s only friends in a village on the edge of the world of fairy tales. Every four years, two kids from their village are chosen for the School of Good and Evil, one for each side. When these two girls are picked, Sophie’s horrified to find herself in Evil, with ugly clothes, ugly classmates, and not a handsome prince or a pink dress in sight. Agatha’s not happy with being in Good, where she feels equally out of place. All she wants is to get them both home again, but all Sophie wants is her prince, and she’ll do anything to sabotage Agatha’s plans to get what she wants. But Tedros, the son of King Arthur and the prince Sophie thinks is hers, is drawn, against his will, to Agatha…
Just when readers think a happy ending with no princes involved has been reached, with the two girls home again and their friendship stronger than ever, the magic of the Woods Beyond sucks them back in. The School for Good and Evil has been changed by the ending of the first story. Now it is the School for Boys and Girls, A World Without Princes, and the two sides are at war. Once again, Agatha strives to make a happy ending for herself and her friend, which means overcoming the power of the story they are trapped in. Once again Sophie, and her desire for a happy ending with Tedros, is a wildcard in Agatha’s plans, and when the Story Master himself promises her the dream of true love and power she craves, she says yes. Unfortunately, he is the most powerful evil villain of them all….and once again there’s no lasting happy ending.
The School for Good and Evil (The School for Good and Evil Series #1)
Soman Chainani
4.2
Paperback
$9.99
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The Last Ever After brings Agatha and Tedros back to what is now simply the School for Evil, to break the thrall of the Story Master over Sophie. Their allies are the heroes of classic fairytales, now unfortunately somewhat geriatric. But Merlin still has considerable magical power, and Agatha can’t give up her hope that her old friendship with Sophie will be enough to save her from the Story Master. The resistance efforts of Good against the School for Evil and its army of zombie villains is tense and exciting, but at last another happy ending is reached, with the Story Master vanquished, Agatha and Tedros setting off to rule Camelot, and Sophie the new dean of the evil side of the restored and rebalanced School for Good and Evil.
Quests for Glory picks up as this “happy ending” gets going. Sophie is transforming the School for Evil in her own image (with, for instance, a wild party whose theme is “Night of a Thousand Sophies.”) And in Camelot, Agatha and Tedros are trying to figure out how to build a solid relationship and how to rebuild a kingdom that’s mysteriously bankrupt. Agatha is frustrated by having to plan the royal wedding, while Tedros struggles to become king. Excalibur, his father’s sword, remains stubbornly stuck in its stone, and if he can’t pull it free he won’t be fully acknowledged as the rightful ruler.
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More worryingly, a new and sinister evil has emerged and is wreaking havoc across the kingdoms. The fourth year students from the school, Agatha and Sophie’s former classmates, are scattered all over on required quests, and group by group is falling into danger. Camelot’s power is under attack, and everything seems very desperate indeed….once again, the happy ending is in jeopardy.
This fourth book is the most traditional fantasy of the series so far, pitting kids (even though they are about to be married, Tedros and Agatha are still fairly young teens) against a formidable magical danger. Now that the school is not the focal point of the story, journeys to many far flung kingdoms add welcome depth to the world-building. Though many new characters are introduced, the questing part of the book gives readers a chance to revisit many old friends, both good and evil, and this is a delightful! It’s also something of a relief that the Agatha/Tedros/Sophie love-triangle has been resolved, and the more serious issue of actually building genuine relationships become important. That being said, Sophie, being Sophie, plunges into fresh complications, and once again (as is expected for the first book of a trilogy), there’s no clear cut path to a Happy Ever After.
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Quests for Glory brings new energy to the series that will satisfy die-hard fans, while also being a treat for readers just starting Agatha and Sophie’s story! If you’re seeking books for a 9-12 year old boy, don’t be dissuaded from these because there are girls on the cover. My own, now 14 year old son, started reading them as they came out, and he and many of his friends, both boys and girls, love them.
If you are planning to buy this one for a young fan, I recommend the Barnes and Noble exclusive edition, which comes with the sort of fun extra content that young readers will love! (Such as a full color copy of The Royal Rat newspaper, whose purple journalism adds a lot of humor to the story).
Don’t miss our buy one, get one free promotion on School for Good and Evil paperbacks, now through September 3, and while supplies last!