The Alexandrian Society is a secret society of magical academicians, the best in the world. Their members are caretakers of lost knowledge from the greatest civilizations of antiquity. Those who earn a place among their number will secure a life of wealth, power, and prestige beyond their wildest dreams. Each decade, the world’s six most uniquely talented magicians are selected for initiation.

Five, they are told, will be initiated. One will be eliminated.
If they can prove themselves to be the best, they will survive.
Most of them.

The writing of this book is, unarguably, immaculate. The language is colourful, the ideas presented daring. You simply cannot fault it.

It was enough to carry me through the first half of this book, but then the following became more and more obvious to me:

What is missing here is any type of dramatic arc, any sense of story progression. There seems an awful lot of talk - mind you in a wonderful dark academia setting - but an awfully negligible amount of action.

The characters barely grew. They were all extremely annoying. The author did too much stating that the characters were powerful, but not really showing. The characters all hated each other and barely interacted. Nothing really happened for a year?

The author also tried to give the characters this weird lofty opinions of themselves and make them serious, but it was just ridiculous.

This started out great! the characters was charming and witty and had great energy that they brought into the story. However towards the middle I grew weary of where it was heading, I was expecting the story to pick up and give us more plot and action which unfortunately I wasn't getting enough of. Eventually I had to put this book down at the moment and intend to pick it up back again when I get the mood since I heard it's a series! which interests me a lot.

This book is so intellectual i had to pay attention very well while reading and so i feel like i put a lot of effort in (sorry if i am dumb) but there was not a whole lot of reward. The ending was not satisfying, even if there is a book two coming it wasn’t quite enough of that dramatic cliff hanger but it did not tie up like any ? loose ends. Another review I read said it is like an itch you can’t scratch and that was a perfect description. i do want to read the next installment though.

I can see the allure with this one though sadly, I struggled twice to finish this and failed both times. While the premise was intriguing and I liked the alternating POVs, after that initial spark very little happens at all until the end. It became and felt tedious and pretentious while little character development occurs.

Without any action, without much character growth, the story feels like it has no where to go and nothing to say. The ending was certainly a cliffhanger that makes me want to read the next book, but I do desperately hope there’s more plot wise to keep the action going.

I was beyond excited to read this book - it felt as if it had everything that would appeal to me. It didn't.

What it did have was characters that I disliked immensely. If they would have been a little more likable the book would have been more enjoyable. The plot was fine, I just didn't care about any of them and hoped for a quick ending.

It gets great reviews, so could have surely been me.

A dark academia novel that begins a planned trilogy and is a viral BookTok sensation has a lot of hype going for it and a lot of expectations to fulfill. In fantastical, magic-based stories everything hinges on how fully realized the alternate universe is to the reader and Olivie Blake’s debut does a serviceable job of doing that, but the focus is really on the six chosen magicians, their actions, motivations and interpersonal relationships.

I couldn't figure out if I liked this for awhile. I think it definitely ended stronger than it started, and I think a lot of that had to do with Blake successfully taking the characters from tropes to well thought out and developed individuals. She pulled this off well, and I will for sure be reading the sequel.

this was a very enjoyable read, it took me ages to finally get the courage to read it because the hype train made me nervous but here i am finally saying: it was amazing! and i’m so freaking ready for the sequel!!!!

An absolutely great dark academia book. I didn’t even realize I enjoyed this genre so much until reading The Atlas Six.
The pacing was good, the build up was great, the character growth was perfect.
It left me wanting more and I will definitely be reading the second book.

The Atlas Six filled the dark academia hole in my life. I was instantly sold on the concept and I really enjoyed most of the characters (there were two who didn't exactly land for me-- I found Tristan and Callum to be slightly interchangeable at times, despite their different powers and motivations). I stalled out a bit in the middle but once we started learning more about the Alexandrian society, I became much more interested to see where the story goes next. I will definitely pick up the sequel!

As a friend so perfectly put it, "this book is everything ‘a deadly education’ wishes it could be." The magic system is cool, the characters even more so. Though slow at many points, I felt like it was just right in keeping with the spellbinding feel of the whole story. Can't wait to see what's next!

Interesting.

This book is art. It's written with such flair, skill, beauty that you can't stop reading even when you want to. I NEEDED answers, and NEEDED to continue this journey.

The characters are diverse and have growth throughout. It's hard to decided wether you love or hate each one. Sometimes I did both, simultaneously.

I figured out the "bad guys" early on and very little was a surprise to me. Hence the 4 stars instead of 5.

Will definitely read the next book.

I LOVED this book during the first half! It was beautifully written, engaging, and the character development is masterful!! However, somewhere past the halfway point, I just lost interest. I wanted more action and plot. It got redundant and a bit boring. I actually had to put it down, and I plan on finishing it another time.

So, This book was one of my most anticipated books of the year. I had watched a youtube channel and had seen that person had LOVED the self published book so much she was going to buy the new and improved book that was being published by Macmillan-Tor/Forge, Tor Books. I immediately took to Netgalley and searched for this book. I thought the concept was amazing and I had never really quite read anything that sounded like it. Thankfully the publisher and Netgalley approved my request. I dived right into the book. However, I had noticed very quickly, I just couldn't get into the book. At that point I turned to Goodreads and was reading some reviews, researching the overall rating and re-reading the summary. I felt then that maybe I should give this another shot because like the youtuber, EVERYONE was RAVING about this book. I gave it 3 tries. I also waited until it published and then borrowed the audiobook from my library TWICE. Ultimately, I just couldn't finish the book past 40%. I did not connect with the characters (although the character development was good) and the story seemed to be dragging out... a lot. Maybe one day, I will try the audiobook again because like I said the concept of the storyline is very intriguing to me.

I absolutely loved this book. This was exactly what I look for when I want to read dark academia. This was the perfect balance between fantasy elements and commentary on society and the world. Although the writing was a little pretentious, I found it enlightening and smart rhetoric on the situations that the characters found themselves in. I also loved how unlikeable and flawed the characters were, and I felt like I was both rooting for them and also rooting against all of them. I heard a lot of reviews saying that this book was boring but I did not feel that way at all about this, I found myself fully emerged in this story and unable to put it down.

The dark academia book of my dreams. I absolutely loved this book, the characters, the setting. It was all perfect. I bought myself a physical copy!

This really scratched that magical/dark academia vibe for me. I am excited to read the sequel and more from Olivie Blake. While it dragged a little (for me) in the middle, I couldn't stop thinking about it all day and anticipating when I could pick it back up again.

I was really intrigued by all of the characters in this book, and I can't wait to see where they all go from here. I definitely loved the dark academia vibes and I'm excited to read the sequel.

Love a good dark academia! Definitely left me wanting more! The perspectives were unique and the plot was captivating.