In Summary

Rating: ★★★

Genre: Fiction

Publication date: 03/03/2022

Number of pages: 384

Keywords: magical society, enemies to friends, young adult, booktok, dark academia

Content warnings: some mild sexual content, reference to suicide

Format: hardback, audiobook, Kindle

The Review: BookTok made me read it; but should I have done and should you? Part Two

The Atlas Six is one of the biggest BookTok sensations, with over 11 million mentions via the hashtag #theatlassix on TikTok and ties with popular social media trends such as “dark academia”. Originally self-published, once it gained popularity on social media there began a bidding war for a major publisher to buy the rights to the full trilogy. I decided to jump on the bandwagon and see if it lived up to the hype.

The story is set in an alternate magical world and we are introduced to six characters through POV chapters. Each are approached by a man named Atlas to join The Alexandrian Society: a secret magical society that only admits the most excellent magicians of the age every 10 years. 

It is revealed that The Great Library of Alexandria was not actually lost, just secreted away and maintained; available to a chosen few of the highest calibre of magical academia. Admission to the society will open doors via its knowledge; with former society members becoming powerful members of business and government. 

However, the twist of joining for the group is that at some point during the first year they must choose to “eliminate” one person, with only five continuing the process. The course of the book follows each character choosing to join the society; their first experiences there; the relationships formed and their thoughts about who is to be eliminated.

I wanted to really like this book after all the hype I’d seen about it: I was a big fan of the Harry Potter books when I was younger and of the Hunger Games as a young adult and this feels like a good mix of the both. Ultimately I have mixed feelings about it, hence the three stars. 

The book gets off to a great start: I was hooked during the first part, where we are introduced to the characters who are being gathered to join The Society. Each person’s unique magical skill sets are detailed and we learn what they might be interested in from having access to an archive of the world’s greatest knowledge. I’m afraid to say that for me this is where my interest dropped off. 

As the plot continues, it really slows down once they are in the house. I had high hopes that we were not just following the character’s journey in the society but that the reader would get a share of the knowledge they gain from the Alexandrian Library. Unfortunately, this is not the case and this disappointed me. 

Ultimately the plot just follows the characters bickering with one another over who might potentially be eliminated rather than on the society itself. I also couldn’t understand the connection between being in The Society and how that leads to great wealth and power. There’s clearly some corruption- my hope is that at least one of the books in the planned trilogy (probably the last one) will deal with this and the knowledge held by The Society can become publicly available, but nothing really touches on it in this book other than The Forum being introduced as being against The Society.

 The writing style is very speech heavy, very “he said, she said” and not very descriptive. For example we know the building is an old English house but there are no details: what are the rooms like; the furniture; the gardens? What sort of documents are in the library; it’s just not enough. The relationships are also too obvious: the novel starts with two characters and all they can say about one another is that they hate each other and so it’s the most unsurprising twist that they have to ultimately work together and form an attachment closer to a friendship. I often had to keep checking back to see which character is narrating the chapter- I’d love it if the POV chapters had different voices but with the writing style remaining the same regardless of who is narrating. 

This book has so much potential and could be so much more in the hands of a more skilled writer, but unfortunately we’re left with a good idea that is poorly executed; with too much focus on the people rather than the setting. The ending also left me disappointed: she’s clearly written this knowing it’s a trilogy but without a satisfying ending. Each book in a trilogy should be a complete book in itself and readers shouldn’t be left feeling flat and unsatisfied at the end. I’d rather the book be 600 pages with a proper conclusion than forced into buying a second book to find out what happens next. I hope that Olivie Blake improves her writing for future books and I may continue the series when the next book is out in October of this year.

Standout Quote: “The problem with knowledge is its inexhaustible craving. The more of it you have, the less you feel you know”

Read if: You enjoy intriguing magical fantasy and dark academia.

Similar books: A cross between Harry Potter and The Hunger Games.

Last impressions: This book has had a lot of hype on TikTok: going from being self-published to a bidding war for a major deal for the rights to publish the full trilogy in the UK. It’s an intriguing story but it doesn’t quite live up to the hype for me. I like the premise of the book but I wish there was more detail, more backstory and more complexity to the plot. It’s too obviously written as a trilogy-I wish this book had a proper ending that could then lead into the next book rather than dropping off on a cliffhanger, making me feel like I have to get the next book to find out what happens next, rather than choosing to continue the story.

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Written by Louise Mortimer