Review: A Lesson in Vengeance

Author: Victoria Lee

Publication Date: 3 August 2021

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Page Count: 384

Reading Method: Finished copy gifted from the publisher

Dates Read: July 28 – August 1 

Synopsis: 

The history of Dalloway School lives in the bones it was built on. Five violent deaths in the first ten years of its existence. Sometimes you can still smell the blood on the air.

It wasn’t until Felicity enrolled that she fell in love with the dark. And now she’s back to finish her senior year after the tragic death of her girlfriend. She even has her old room in Godwin House, the exclusive dormitory rumored to be haunted by the spirits of the five Dalloway students who died there—girls some say were witches.

It’s Ellis Haley’s first year at Dalloway. A prodigy novelist at seventeen, Ellis is eccentric and brilliant, and Felicity can’t shake the pull she feels to her. So when Ellis asks for help researching the Dalloway Five for her second book, Felicity can’t say no.

Dalloway’s occult lore is everywhere, and the new girl won’t let Felicity forget it. But when the past begins to invade on the present, Felicity needs to decide where she stands. The soil under her feet is bloody with Dalloway’s history. But so is the present. Is it Dalloway—or is it her?

Review: 

OMG THAT COVER! It’s so beautiful! And can we please talk about the fact that this is a sapphic dark academia story with witches and a potentially haunted house?!  What’s not to love?  I was so thrilled when A Lesson in Vengeance showed up on my doorstep.  Thank you so much to Underlined and Delacorte Press!

Felicity has returned to Godwin House at Dalloway after the death of her girlfriend, while Ellis is using her time at the school to work on her latest novel. Ellis enlists Felicity’s help because of her knowledge of the witches and dark history associated with Godwin House.  Felicity spends most of the novel struggling with the changes upon returning to the school and the feeling that the witches are haunting her and the house.  As Felicity and Ellis’ relationship progresses, and things start to spin out of control on campus, Felicity must come to terms with her reality and make incredibly difficult decisions about her future.  

The writing in A Lesson in Vengeance is absolutely lovely.  Lee does a magnificent job of setting the scene and creating a haunting, suspenseful, atmospheric story.  There are several instances where Felicity is an unreliable narrator, but it’s done in a way that we really don’t know what the truth is and honestly?  I’m still not entirely sure! You focus so much on Felicity and wondering if her reality is true, that you forget to pay attention to the things and people around her.  I loved the history of the witches and how it was the basis for everything that takes place in the story.  Though the history part was a little repetitive in some places and I started to skim those sections.  

Ellis was a fascinating character and I would have liked a whole story about who she was before she came to Dalloway.  There is one scene in particular that is quite harrowing and made my heart break for her just the tiniest bit.  Ellis is the driving force of this story, constantly pulling Felicity into her orbit and planning new adventures for the two of them.  

I wouldn’t want to give anything away so I’m going to quit while I’m ahead, but I really enjoyed A Lesson in Vengeance!  It was dark, mysterious, disturbing, and utterly engrossing.